Lance's Charges
by what are you even saying
Summary: A slightly more realistic pokemon story about six new trainers who will be forced to face much more than just gym leaders in order to succeed, or even to survive.
1. The Six

**Lance's Charges: Kanto**

A/N: Welcome to my first ever pokemon fanfic! This story doesn't take place in the happy-go-lucky world of Ash and Pikachu. It's my take on what the world of pokemon _should_ be. Team Rocket (though they won't be called "Team" anything in this story) steals pokemon. What they can't steal, they kill. In this world, there aren't magically identical Nurse Joys and Officer Jennys.

There are plenty of idealistic ten-year-olds (Is that how old Ash was?) in this world, but few, if any, are respectable trainers. I've abolished a few other random things in the pokeverse that have always bothered me as well. For example, there is no limit for how many pokemon you carry with you. Trainers in a Pokemon League sanctioned match may use a maximum of six, but may carry as many as they have. That being said, trainers can still choose to store excess pokemon elsewhere. I hope I haven't scared too many potential readers away, but I'm writing this more for myself than anyone else anyway.

This fic was originally going to be something very different. However, I've decided to rework it into a "New Trainers" story. I may eventually write a sequel to it that encompasses my original idea, but I may not.

Finally, I have no intention of incorporating Diamond, Pearl, or any other future regions/pokemon into this story or its possible sequel(s). The only pokemon from that group that I will be using is leafeon, since I think it should have been a part of the original 150, and its evolution will be from using a leaf stone rather than that stupid moss rock shit. Tempted though I may be, glaceon will not be in the story. Another change involving eevee and its evolutions will be espeon and umbreon. They will evolve through either sun stone or moon stone. Why they weren't made like that in the first place is beyond me.

This final note is for those of you who are here because you've read my Harry Potter fanfiction. I have this to say regarding those stories: They aren't abandoned and they aren't low-priority. Right now I'm stuck on all of them, though, so I'm using this piece to give myself a bit of a jump-start.

Disclaimer: I am making no profit whatsoever from this story. I acknowledge the fact that I own no part of the pokemon world, I'm just having some fun with it. Additionally, this disclaimer applies to every single chapter of this story. Why? Because I don't feel like putting it in every chapter.

**Chapter 1: The Six**

The hitmonchan dove forward in a roll, barely escaping the torrential hydro pump attack directly above him. Without slowing, he sprang up and swung forward with one gloved fist, slamming it into the startled poliwrath and releasing a painful jolt of electricity. The water-type was lifted up into the air as yellow bolts darted across her suddenly stiff body.

"Polga, can you get up?" Langston Dowling asked.

"P-p-pol," the paralyzed pokemon said weakly.

"Poliwrath is unable to battle," Langston's son, David, said in the most formal manner he knew how. "Mom wins!" Like most boys his age, David didn't care too much about his appearance. As long as his messy dark brown hair remained messy, and he didn't stain his t-shirt, anything else was fine with him. His shorts were what remained of an old pair of cargo pants after the holes in the knees became too wide, and one could no longer tell what kind of shoes he wore by looking.

Langston sighed. "That's three times in a row I've lost to you, dear." He opened a small pouch attached to his belt and pulled out a cheri berry before carefully inserting it into his pokemon's ever-hidden mouth. Once certain that his poliwrath's paralysis had been lifted, he recalled her into her pokeball.

"Well, you wouldn't lose if you didn't insist on matching me type-for-type," David's mother, Gloria, said dryly. "Now wait just one more minute, David," she said without looking at her son, who was attempting to sneak away.

"Come on!" David said petulantly. "You promised that I could go after the battle!" It never ceased to amaze his parents how differently he acted around them than around anyone else. Around them he seemed to take pleasure in acting several years younger than his actual age of thirteen, whereas the assistants at the local pokemon lab often compared him favorably with colleagues over the age of thirty. His best friend, a girl named Lily, seemed to get some bizarre mix between the two.

"We did, but it was under the condition that you'd tell us something you learned from our battle," Gloria admonished.

"But I didn't learn anything new!" David protested. "Just the same rule that fair play can't be applied to a pokemon battle and that you should use every advantage you've got."

"What do you think?" Gloria asked her husband, raising an eyebrow.

Langston made quite a show of thinking it over, and only answered when it seemed like David was about to interrupt. "He's as ready as he'll ever be. We can't really teach him anything else until he gets some real life experience."

David whooped and ran to his father, hugging him tightly. Deciding to be fair, he pulled away and hugged his mother as well before saying anything. "Good thing you finally caved, I wanna beat everyone else there. Maybe the labcoats will let me spend more time with the pokemon if I get there early!"

"Bye dear," was all Gloria had time to say as he raced out of their backyard and into the street, sprinting towards the local pokemon lab.

"Don't forget to come home before you leave town!" Langston shouted after him. "Think he heard me?"

"It doesn't matter," Gloria said confidently. "He'll want to show us his first pokemon."

* * *

"Took you long enough!"

"Lily! How'd you manage to beat me here?" David asked, skidding to a halt in front of his friend. She was short and quite pretty, but she didn't flaunt it like some girls did. Lily Adams was a firm believer in practicality, insisting that real pokemon trainers couldn't rough it if they were busy trying to make themselves look better, hence her slightly unkempt appearance. She wore her brown hair in a ponytail, preferring to keep it out of her eyes. Her clothes, as usual, were simple, a pair of shorts with a t-shirt to be precise. Since it was a hot day, the overalls that she sometimes wore were absent.

"Knew you'd get here early," she bragged, smiling mischievously. "Besides, it's not like I had any long goodbyes at home."

David was silent, as uncomfortable as he always was when Lily brought up her less than perfect home life.

"Relax, David. It's over, I never even have to see 'em again," Lily said, laying a comforting hand on his shoulder.

David managed a smile at that. It always bothered him that Lily usually ended up comforting him whenever the worst parts of her life came up in conversation. "Well, you knew I'd get here early…did you know why?"

"Hey! Who d'you think you're talking to here? You wanted to see all the pokemon!"

"Yeah, ok, guilty as charged," David admitted, raising his arms in mock-surrender.

"David? Lily? Is that you two out there?" Both immediately turned to see Professor Atwood emerging from the lab. Michael Atwood was a giant of a man, standing at nearly six and a half feet. His hair, or what little David could see of it, was a very pale blonde color. Despite his size, he was probably the least intimidating person David knew. "Good, it is you! The other children are already inside, they've been trying to get me to show them the pokemon for over an hour. I promised that we'd get started as soon as you two arrived."

"An hour?" David asked, mouth agape. "I thought I'd get here early and I end up the last one here…"

"Come on! Don't you want to see the pokemon?" Lily asked.

David nodded in acquiescence as they fell into step with the professor, who brought them into the fairly small laboratory. David and Lily knew exactly where they were headed, since it was the only place in the entire lab that they were banned from entering without Professor Atwood's presence. Soon, they came to the door leading into the small greenhouse that housed the six pokemon they would be choosing from. Their four classmates were already waiting, apparently impatiently.

"It's about time you got here, we've been waiting forever!" Ian McKinley, a tall, fairly strong redhead snapped as they arrived. He'd always had a slight dislike for David, who only returned the sentiment when he was in an especially bad mood. David didn't like the idea of making an enemy of one of the only five kids his age in town, so he tended to frustrate Ian with his indifferent attitude instead.

None of the other three said anything more than a quiet "Hello", all quite eager to receive their first pokemon. Probably the most eager was the cold and ambitious Catherine Morosov, a tall platinum blonde with distinguished good looks. While they all looked forward to becoming trainers, she seemed to thirst for it, and was generally unable to talk about anything else. Her best friend, Madison Carr, a shorter dirty blonde, was practically bouncing off the walls in her excitement as well.

One only needed to observe Catherine and Madison together for a short period of time to realize how true the phrase "Opposites attract" was. Madison was upbeat and quite friendly, but she somehow got along with the standoffish Catherine better than she did with anyone else.

The last person present was Marcus White, a fairly small boy with close-cropped black hair. Marcus wasn't friendly, but he wasn't unfriendly either. He was, in a word, unobtrusive, or in a pair of words, unobtrusive and nondescript.

Together, the six children of Orpiment Town were very different from most in Kanto beginning their journeys as trainers in that they had no intentions of catching a huge number of pokemon. While not all friends, they all had a similar ideal for their futures as pokemon trainers. They had studied pokemon encyclopedias and watched battle tournaments together for years, learning all they could about the pokemon that would someday be available to them, and they all had their own ideas of which would be acceptable in a team. They were different because none of them were becoming trainers to fill up a pokedex or catch every single variety of pokemon. They all wanted to catch a few with potential, and then they wanted to train them to the highest level possible. They wanted to be known as the best of the best.

"As you all know, three of the pokemon in the lab are Kanto's standard starting choices: charmander, bulbasaur and squirtle," Professor Atwood said. "What we've kept you in the dark about is what the other three pokemon are. It took a great deal of negotiating, but we were able to obtain the Johto region's three starters as well, cyndaquil, chikorita and totodile."

As expected, there was a great deal of eager muttering at this. None of them had even brought up the Johto pokemon as a possibility, since Johto had much less friendly relations with Kanto than Hoenn did. The kids had discussed the likelihood of the Hoenn starters being available, but they all agreed that the strongest possibility was that one of the breeding farms around Celadon would donate three eevee to the group. David could see Lily mentally reassessing her preferences with the new information. His own preferred pokemon, charmander, remained unchanged.

"Now," Professor Atwood began, waving his keys in front of their faces, "I know that you all probably have a good idea which pokemon you'll choose, but remember, things don't always go as you expect. Last year we tried a new experiment where we had the pokemon out when the kids entered, and it was a disaster. The bulbasaur rejected all three of the young trainers-to-be, so we decided to go back to the tried and true method of picking without meeting the pokemon first."

"What happened to the bulbasaur?" Madison asked. Everyone present knew that it would be her choice no matter what.

"We kept it for an extra year. It's in one of the pokeballs inside," Professor Atwood said, turning to unlock the door as Madison smiled, confident that she would be able to win the difficult grass-type over.

"Are there any other...quirks we should know about that any of the rest of the pokemon have, Professor?" Catherine asked.

"Half the fun is discovering the quirks yourself," the professor replied with a smile, opening the door. Despite his size, he was almost crushed against the wall as the kids raced past him into the greenhouse. The six pokeballs were spread out in the different habitats, two by the water, and the other four spread out in the grass. David noticed Ian and Catherine heading to the water as he began his own search. The first ball he approached had a small tag attached that read "Cyndaquil", but the one next to it was the charmander he'd been waiting for.

Professor Atwood watched in amusement as the kids quickly sorted out the pokemon and divided them up. To have no arguments break out over the initial selection process was almost unheard of, but he had come to expect unusual things from that particular group. He knew that only David, Ian and Madison felt strongly about the three Kanto starters, and would have worried that the other three would fight over the Johto pokemon if it weren't for their temperaments. Neither Lily nor Marcus was likely to argue over it, and because of that, Catherine would get her first choice. If she and Ian had set their sights on the same pokemon, then he would have had a legitimate concern.

"Now that you all have your first pokemon, I should probably give you these." He took off the shoulder bag he had been wearing and set it on the ground, kneeling to unzip it. "There's a pokedex and two pokeballs for all of you in here, come on over and grab them."

David held the button on his pokeball down until it shrunk and then carefully placed it over one of the specialized magnets on his belt. The ball flew the last couple of inches from his hand and slid into place over the first magnet. He saw the others imitating the motion.

"The dex will be a lifeline for you in the wild," the professor said as they began their inspection of their devices. "In addition to having a truly impressive amount of information about the pokemon you'll encounter, it also has a map feature with a built-in locator, meaning you won't be getting lost any time soon, as well as a fully functional email system that gets updates from the pokemon league as well as any nearby cities regarding any important news. You'll get used to it in time, just don't lose it, since they're fairly expensive to replace." He let out a nervous chuckle.

Catherine looked up. "Is there anything else, Professor?" She had a way of speeding up potentially awkward situations that David admired.

"No, no," Professor Atwood said. "You're all free to go. Good luck out there! Actually, if you'll excuse me, I've got an appointment with Dr. Buford in fifteen minutes..." With that, he left, slowing only to duck under the relatively low doorway at the end of the hall.

"So where's everyone headed?" Madison blurted out, clearly having been holding herself back for quite some time. She had the curious habit of clamming up around adults, and never shutting up when surrounded by her peers.

It was actually a fairly good question. Orpiment was located a few miles northeast of Celadon, putting it close to three cities.

David and Lily exchanged glances as Ian watched, but it was Marcus who spoke first. "I plan on tackling Celadon first, since Ignigena will have a type advantage there."

"Already thought of a nickname?" Lily asked. "What's it mean?"

"It means 'born of fire', or something roughly equivalent," Marcus said.

"I like it," Catherine said decisively. "Are you going to name all of your pokemon in Latin?"

"Probably," he replied. "But we've gotten off topic, where are you planning to go?"

"I don't really have any easy routes to take from here, so I was thinking of going to Cerulean first and then heading west through Mt. Moon."

"Since I've got bulbasaur, that works out perfectly for me too," Madison said with a smug smile. She and Catherine had clearly planned their route beforehand. David was kicking himself for not thinking of doing the same thing with Lily. Sure enough, Ian saw his internal frustration and quickly moved to capitalize on it.

"What about you, David?" he asked, dislike seeping into his tone. He hated it when David and Lily acted so close.

"I dunno," David said, desperately thinking of a route that would work for both him and Lily. He knew she was doing the same thing. "I might head past Saffron into Vermillion and then come back to Celadon."

"That sounds good," Lily said, breathing a sigh of relief. "I think I'll take that route as well."

"Why?" Ian asked rudely. "I mean, you could just go with Madison and Catherine, and David could go straight to Celadon, which is the smartest thing to do anyway."

"I'd rather my charmander know a couple of fire moves before I try to take on Erika, Ian," David said, suppressing his annoyance. "Besides, Catherine is planning on fighting Misty first, when she could go after Brock almost as easily by going west from here."

"Where are _you_ going, anyway?" Lily asked, not caring to hide her own annoyance.

Ian seemed to shrink before their very eyes under Lily's criticism. David could see that he was tempted to say Vermillion, but realized that his squirtle would be trounced in that gym. "Actually, I think I might tag along with you two, if you don't mind," he said, nodding at Madison and Catherine.

"'Course not!" Madison said brightly as Catherine nodded in agreement. "But I've got first dibs on Misty."

"Sure, sure," Ian said with a slight smile as the tension that was previously present vanished.

"Come to think of it," Marcus said, turning to David, "I think you might be right. Ignigena won't learn her first fire attack until even later than your charmander, so would it bother either of you to have a third?"

"Not really," David said, looking at Lily for confirmation. She nodded, but looked slightly putout at the same time.

"Wait, you said 'her', how do you know your cyndaquil's gender already if you haven't let her out?" Madison asked.

"I scanned the ball with my pokedex a couple of minutes ago," Marcus replied.

"I didn't know they could scan for gender," David said while they all quickly pulled out their own dexes. "Let's see here...it says charmander is male, so I think I'll name him Apollo."

"Good one!" Lily exclaimed, though David had already confided his preferred nickname to her. "What do you think I should name my chikorita? He's a male too."

"Maybe you should try something in Latin," Ian said. "Any suggestions, Marc?"

"Let me think," he said. "There are quite a few things that could work, I guess. Frondosum, Frondiferum, Vitisatoris-"

"What's that one mean?" Lily asked.

"I think it's associated with gardening. It doesn't quite mean gardener, but it does involve planting vines."

"Good enough!" Lily announced.

"No need to name mine, Marcus," Catherine said. "I've decided to call her Karina."

"Going to use human names for all of them?" Marcus asked, imitating her earlier question.

"Probably, but I might end up doing the same thing as Madison."

"Which is...what?" Ian asked.

"I'm naming my bulbasaur Lopia," Madison said. "But that probably doesn't help you at all. Basically, I'm just going to make up the names as I go along, random syllable combinations that suit whatever pokemon I end up catching."

"That's pretty similar to what I was thinking," Lily said. "Then again, I blanked on a nickname for my first, so there's no telling what I'll end up doing."

"Don't worry too much about it, I can't come up with anything either," Ian said. "Hey Marc, think you could help me out naming squirtle? He's a he, and I want something that sounds pretty tough."

Marcus blushed, unused to getting such attention from all of his peers. "Sure, no problem. There are a lot of words for 'protector' or 'guardian', but most of them have associations in our language, like Curatoris or Custodire."

"You could call him Argus," David suggested. "He was a giant in Greek mythology that guarded a nymph named Io." He looked at Marcus to make sure the smaller boy wasn't mad at him for stealing his thunder, but he looked a more relieved than anything else.

"That sounds pretty good," Ian admitted. "Do you know any other kinds of myths, like ones that aren't Greek?" He knew that David was going to be using Greek mythology as a general theme for his nicknames and didn't want the association.

"I know a few Norse gods," David offered. "Njord is the god of the sea, but it's kinda hard to say fast-"

"No, I like it," Ian interrupted. "I think I'll use that one."

"It's pretty cool," Madison agreed, "and there's no way anyone else will be using that name."

"Now that we've all settled on names," Catherine began, authority seeping into her voice, "I'd like to show Karina off to my family. Madison, Ian, shall we meet at the northern end of town in an hour?"

"Better make that an hour and a half," Madison said with a sheepish smile. "You know how my mom gets about this kind of thing."

"What about you, Marcus, how much time do you think you'll need?" Lily asked, knowing that she would be going back to David's house with him rather than see her father again.

"I'll probably need an hour and a half as well. Jared is back from Indigo Plateau, and he said he wanted to give me something before I leave."

"That's fine, we'll meet you by the south gates then." David said, gesturing to include Lily and eliciting a small frown from Ian.

On that note, the group split up and went their separate ways. Marcus fell into step with Madison and Catherine, since they all lived on the same block on the western side of town. Ian, who actually lived very close to Lily, walked east while David and Lily headed south.

"Hang on a sec," Lily said after the others were out of sight.

"What for?" David asked, slowing down in spite of the question.

"Don't you want to meet Apollo before your parents do?" Lily asked, pulling out Vitisatoris' pokeball and enlarging it.

"Fair point," David agreed, pulling out his own pokeball and double tapping the button to enlarge it and release his charmander.

The lizard pokemon looked confused when it first materialized, but it quickly recognized the pokeball in David's hand and came to the obvious conclusion.

"I'm David," the boy said hesitantly, realizing belatedly that he didn't know what to say to his first pokemon. He had no idea how to go about treating him. Sure enough, Apollo was looking him up and down and didn't seem particularly impressed. David sighed and continued in a stronger tone. "I'll be your trainer from now on. I've decided to call you Apollo, what do you think?"

The charmander met his gaze and barked a low "Char" that was accompanied by a nod.

"Glad we've settled that, then," David said with a smile, inwardly jumping for joy that Apollo had apparently accepted him as his trainer. "We're going to meet my parents along with Lily and Vitisatoris." Apollo followed his gaze to where Lily was already hugging her chikorita, indicating a degree of acceptance on her pokemon's part.

"Ready to go, then?" Lily asked when she caught them looking. "Your parents probably won't keep us too long, but we should hurry over there anyway just in case."

"Agreed," David said before turning back to his pokemon. "I'll call you back out soon, Apollo, but since you'll probably be battling before the end of the day, you should rest for now." With that, he recalled the charmander.

"Sorry, Vitis, but he makes a good point," Lily said, a red glow already surrounding her chikorita.

"So are you nervous?" Lily asked after a minute's silence.

"Terrified," David said, but he was smiling. "I'm really glad we're going on this thing together, though, that really helps. Marcus too, I guess."

"Better him than Ian," Lily muttered darkly. Her dislike for the often-abrasive redhead far outstripped David's.

"You know, we should have battled back at the lab," David said thoughtfully.

"What, you and Ian?" Lily asked.

"No! Well, maybe, but I meant all of us. Now that we've split into groups of three, we can't match up and have our first battles with each other."

"How would we do the match-ups?" Lily asked. "Johto against Kanto doesn't seem too smart, since the Johto starters aren't all that tough until they've evolved once."

"None of our pokemon will learn any of their special moves for a couple of days, at least," David pointed out. "We wouldn't have to fight by type."

"I know, but there is still a slight difference between the two sets of starters," Lily said.

David shrugged. "Yeah, I guess you're right."

"When am I ever wrong?"

"I'm sure I could think of a time or two, like maybe when you thought it would be a great idea for me to jump on the back of Ricky Carlisle's lanturn."

"What are you talking about? That _was_ a good idea!" Lily said.

"For you, maybe," David growled.

"Naturally," Lily said, tossing her hair and laughing her best friend's irritation off.

Luckily for David, the pair had finally arrived at his house. His parents, rather than go back inside, had opted to wait for them on the porch. David was a bit surprised to see that they had recalled their pokemon. They tended to leave them out, since most pokemon preferred being able to roam around to being in a pokeball, even though the process was actually quite pleasant for them.

"We didn't want to spook your pokemon with ours," Langston explained, seeing his son's confusion. "I remember Daruga being completely terrified by your grandfather's pidgeotto when I first brought him home."

Lily giggled a bit at that. Daruga was a blastoise, and it was hard to picture him being intimidated by anything.

"That's just 'cause Daruga's always been such a softie," David said with a grin. "Apollo wouldn't be scared at all."

"Apollo, is it?" Gloria asked. "So you got your charmander, then?"

"Sure did!" David said enthusiastically. "You can meet him now, hang on." It took an extra hard tug to remove Apollo's pokeball from his belt, but a moment later the charmander was looking around in confusion at his surroundings.

"Oh, he's wonderful!" Gloria gushed, bending down to give the pokemon a friendly pat on the head. Apollo seemed to like the treatment, if his purring was any indicator.

"And what did you choose?" Langston asked Lily, allowing his wife to have her moment with their son's first pokemon before his turn came.

"I got a chikorita named Vitisatoris," Lily said proudly, releasing her pokemon.

"Pretty tough to pronounce," Langston commented, looking at the grass pokemon closely. As soon as Vitisatoris was released, however, he zeroed in on Apollo, not having truly met him yet. Apollo seemed equally intrigued, and was now ignoring David's mother entirely, much to her chagrin.

"They seem to be getting along ok," Lily said, looking slightly worried. The two pokemon approached each other carefully, offering tentative sniffs, but neither one risking contact just yet. Finally, Apollo grinned contentedly and plopped down right in front of Vitisatoris, offering a friendly wave and seeming completely at ease. At his counterpart's action, Vitisatoris followed suit, tucking his four stubby legs under himself.

"Glad you two are getting along so well," David said, amused by the whole encounter. Apollo offered him a cheeky smile in response before lying back, careful to keep his tail away from Vitisatoris as he moved it out from under himself.

Gloria and Langston shared a look. While the pokemon looked perfectly content with sitting there all day, both children were clearly very eager to leave.

"All right, kids, as much as we appreciate you coming back here, there's no need to stay any longer just for us. We know you'll call every now and then, at least," Langston said, clapping David on the shoulder.

"You _will_ call, won't you?" Gloria asked sharply.

"I'll make sure he does, Mrs. Dowling," Lily promised.

"We'd love to hear from _both_ of you," Langston said, meeting Lily's gaze and smiling warmly at her. She had become like a daughter to the Dowlings over the years.

"Don't worry, I'll make sure we both call plenty," David said, reaching his arm around a red-faced Lily and pulling her into a brief one-armed embrace.

"Be safe, you two," Gloria said softly, tears in her eyes now. She hugged them both tightly to her, but released them before either one could complain about lack of breath. "Keep them safe," she said to Apollo and Vitisatoris. Both pokemon nodded solemnly.

"And remember, we're proud of you no matter what," Langston said, giving them an embrace of his own.

David and Lily recalled their pokemon and left minutes later, walking backwards and waving until the Dowlings were out of sight.

"When do you want to challenge the gym in Saffron?" Lily asked, catching David completely off guard.

"Um...I don't know, really. Sabrina is supposed to be one of the toughest challenges, no matter when you fight her on your journey. I mean you've heard the stories, haven't you?"

"That she's crazy? I don't believe it. It makes for good fiction, sure, but the League is so strict these days, especially after the Viridian gym fiasco." She was referring to the discovery that one of the eight league sanctioned gyms in Kanto was being run by the Rocket organization, the group that was responsible for nearly all of the League's problems. The gym had been taken by force by a team of powerful trainers led by the Elite Four, and hundreds of stolen pokemon were discovered on the premises. The League had demolished the building, reconstructing it in record time and putting a new gym leader in charge only two years earlier.

"I don't know what to believe about her, really," David said. "But either way, I'm nervous about taking on the psychic gym this early."

"I am too, to be honest," Lily agreed. "Maybe we should think about going after her again after we take on Erika. We'll hopefully have two badges by then, and maybe a tough enough team to take her on."

"Yeah, maybe," David said, lost in thought. He had always been slightly intimidated by psychic pokemon ever since seeing one completely brutalize its opponent on television. He had seen similar things happen in other battles, but watching a pokemon's legs snap seemingly without provocation had affected him quite strongly.

They reached the south gates seconds later, both occupied by thoughts of what lay ahead.

* * *

"I'm back, Mother, Father," Catherine said, entering the sitting room of her family's enormous Victorian house.

"Did everything go well?" Catherine's father, Hugo Morosov asked. He was older than most of the other parents in Orpiment, nearly sixty, in fact. His carefully groomed hair and moustache were already stark white, seemingly at odds with his almost ageless face.

"Of course. I chose a totodile and named her Karina."

"That's a fine name," Monica, Catherine's mother, said, giving her daughter a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. Catherine got most of her looks from her mother, but their hair was in stark contrast, her own pale blonde to her mother's near-black shade. "Let's have a look, shall we?"

Catherine obediently released Karina, and was unable to suppress a smile when her new pokemon squealed with glee and squeezed her leg in a tight embrace.

"Hello there, I'm Catherine, and these are my parents," Catherine said, pointing out her parents in turn. "And if it's all right with you, I've chosen Karina as your name." The totodile seemed content enough with that, but was unwilling to look either of her parents in the eye.

"It's a bit of a runt, isn't it?" Mr. Morosov said, not troubling to keep his voice down.

"Karina is a _girl_, Father," Catherine said softly.

"It–oh all right, _she_ isn't a runt, merely young. She hasn't grown all she will before her evolution," Mrs. Morosov said.

"She'll do just fine, then," Mr. Morosov said blandly.

"I'm glad you approve, Father," Catherine said, still outwardly calm. Inside she was reeling. How could she have expected them to behave differently about this? They had never given her any cause to think that they cared about her happiness. When they heard about her dream of becoming a pokemon trainer, her father had snorted and said, "I suppose it's best to get it out of your system early, dear. You'll still be able to find yourself a respectable niche later in life." Now her poor Totodile was nearly in tears at her feet, and she had absolutely no idea how to begin to tell them how betrayed she felt.

"I'm leaving now," Catherine said, picking up Karina by the armpits and holding her as closely as she could. "I'll call when I can." Without waiting for a reply from her parents, Catherine turned and walked out, comforting Karina as she walked.

"It's all right, they're both fools," she said gently. "You're the best there is, that's why I chose you." Her words were a lie, but Catherine was determined to change that.

She arrived at the north gates to find them empty of her classmates, so she sat down on the ground and waited. Karina drew lines in the nearby soil with her claw as a multitude of fantasies played through Catherine's head, each more exciting than the last.

* * *

"So you didn't like those other trainers, huh?"

Madison had released Lopia immediately after branching off from Marcus and Catherine. The bulbasaur had taken one look at her trainer, snorted, and turned away.

"Well I'm different than them. I've been waiting to get you for eight years. I've known I wanted a bulbasaur for eight years! If you really think you're going to scare me off by ignoring me, you're in for a shock. Now look at me."

"Saur." Lopia's tone was mocking, but it was still an improvement.

"I've decided to call you Lopia," Madison said, seeming unbothered by the bulbasaur's stubbornness. "What do you think of the name?"

"Bulba." A bit friendlier, though it remained far from friendly.

"Glad you don't mind it too much. It seems like you aren't going to change your mind about me yet, but I hope you can put on a good show for my family."

Lopia's return to the silent treatment indicated that she could, but wasn't likely to.

"Return," Madison muttered, recalling Lopia back into her pokeball. She looked at it in her hand, frowning momentarily, before letting it slide into place on her belt. Madison wasn't the type to let her bulbasaur's attitude bother her, not yet. It would probably take several weeks of failure before she would even show the first hint of fatigue. Head held up high, she marched across the street to her house only to be intercepted by a sixty-five pound missile in the middle of the road.

"Maddy!"

"Hey there," Madison said, ruffling her youngest sibling and only brother, Micah's hair. "Where's everyone else?"

"Just inside. Mom put a movie in because Fiona and Laura wouldn't shut up about next year." Fiona and Laura were identical twins, and were only eleven months younger than Madison. They were quite eager to become trainers themselves. Micah and Sara, the two youngest, were somewhat less eager, but that desire would increase as they got older.

Micah grabbed Madison's hand and pulled her inside, where she immediately heard Laura's favorite movie playing in the next room. Fiona could be heard grumbling along with every bit of dialog, she hated "Land of the Dusclops".

"She's back! She's back!" Micah exclaimed, drawing everyone's attention. Within seconds, Madison was besieged by questions about her bulbasaur (her family was well aware of her obsession) as well as what the others chose.

"What did Catherine get?" Sara, who very nearly worshipped the older girl, asked.

"She picked a totodile," Madison said.

"Who cares about that, let's meet your bulbasaur!" Fiona exclaimed. Madison met her mother's gaze and rolled her eyes, somehow failing to give the impression that she was more mature than her siblings.

"I don't think so, Lopia's pretty tired right now," Madison said.

"Come on!"

"Please?"

"Pretty please?" Sara, of course.

"Ok, but don't blame me if she's cranky," Madison warned, enlarging Lopia's pokeball and releasing her. The bulbasaur was immediately surrounded on all sides by giggling children, which she couldn't stand. One pleading look at her trainer told her that any help would have a high price. She was fully prepared to stoically accept the treatment rather than admit defeat until Micah stuck a wet finger in her ear.

"Bulba!" Lopia demanded.

Madison grinned, happy that her family had unknowingly helped her control her bulbasaur, and recalled the grass-type.

"Aww, she was only out for a second!" Sara protested.

"She has to battle later," Madison said. "You guys were tiring her out." She looked up at her parents, who weren't fooled in the slightest.

"We have a gift for you, honey, before you leave," her father, Noah, said. His wife, Rita, was rummaging through her purse even as he spoke.

"Here it is!" Rita exclaimed, pulling out a dull green pokeball with two concentric brown circles around it and handing it to Madison.

"Oh wow, a nest ball!" Madison exclaimed, leaning forward to hug her parents. "This'll be perfect for catching something on the road!"

"You might want to consider using it fairly soon," Noah said. "Those things are for weaker pokemon, so I don't want to hear any sob stories about how you tried to use it on a rhydon."

"I'm the one that wants a rhydon, Dad, not Maddy," Laura said impatiently.

"How could you forget something so important, Noah?" Rita asked, her eyes dancing with mirth.

"I'm very sorry, Laura," Noah said, trying to keep a straight face while she lectured him on her favorite pokemon for the umpteenth time.

"I'm Fiona, Dad!" Laura shouted, elbowing her twin to keep her from laughing.

"Nice try, Laura, but that hasn't worked yet, and it won't start now," Rita said sternly.

Madison sighed and rolled her eyes. At this rate, she'd never be able to leave!

* * *

"Mom? I'm back!" Ian called, Njord at his side.

Nadine McKinley stepped out of the kitchen, looking as motherly as anyone possibly could. She was tall, like her son, but two pregnancies–one of which had resulted in a miscarriage–had taken their toll on her body. While she was still fairly pretty, she was close to, if not _the_ most overweight person in town. While that wasn't saying much, it was still something. Ian immediately noticed the bag lunch in her hand, as well as the fact that she hadn't bothered to take her apron off after making breakfast.

"Oh Ian, he's adorable. What's his name?" Nadine, like so many other adults, had developed the useful skill of figuring out a pokemon's gender at a glance, which was actually very difficult with most species.

"Njord," Ian said, puffing his chest out at the mere mention of his squirtle's tough name, despite where it came from. "He's going to be the best, Mom, just wait and see. I'll make you proud."

"You've already done that," Nadine said, her eyes moist. "I'm going to miss you so much, Ian." She drew Ian into a hug, doing her level best to squeeze the life out of him.

He hugged her back, unsurprised to feel tears running down his own cheeks as well as hers. He'd get them out of the way now; crying in front of his peers would be awful! "Don't worry, Mom, you won't be all alone. Myles isn't going anywhere, is he?" Myles Buford had entered their lives shortly after Ian's father, Conrad, had left them both. While wedding bells weren't likely to be heard in the near future, Myles treated both Nadine and Ian quite well, and he was in the relationship for keeps.

"Yes, I don't know what I'd do without my two boys," Nadine said, pulling back and wiping the tears off of her son's face. "I packed your lunch with your favorite, and there's a surprise waiting for you in your pack. Don't get too excited, it's nothing exciting. Still, don't look in here, wait until you leave."

"Why's that?" Ian asked.

"It'll give you a reason to call from your first stop," Nadine said with a smile.

"Mom! You don't have to worry about that, I'll always call," Ian promised.

"I know you will, you're a good boy. Be safe out there, and don't trust too easily."

Ian rolled his eyes. "Don't worry, I won't. I love you, Mom."

"I love you too. Keep him safe, Njord." They embraced one last time before Ian and his squirtle walked out, glad that he had already spent his tears. Madison and Catherine would be nice about it, but he didn't want them to think he was weak.

* * *

"Fred, come quick! Look at the pokemon your son picked!" Most mothers would only ever refer to their children like that when angry, but Gertrude White was the exception, only doing so when she was proud. She was Marcus' height, only a couple inches over five feet, but had such a forceful presence that many others in Orpiment actually thought she was much taller.

"Wow! I had no idea they'd make the Johto starters available to you! What's her name?" Fred White was just a hair under five-ten, and was the spitting image of his son, with a thin face and short, black hair.

"Ignigena," Marcus said, unable to keep from smiling. "These are my parents," he added, kneeling down and patting his cyndaquil on the head.

"Quil," she chirped enthusiastically, rubbing her head against his parents' legs.

"She's really friendly," Fred said, grinning.

"Much friendlier than Tarquinn was when you first started," Gertrude teased, referring to Fred's venusaur. He and Gertrude had been two of the starting trainers in Orpiment nearly twenty years earlier, but neither one had the ambition necessary to succeed. Instead, they caught a small number of pokemon each and sought to learn all they could about them, becoming self-employed pokemon researchers. That was one year that Orpiment could collectively stand to forget. Every year at the League Tournament, Orpiment's new trainers sought out Pallet's, and they would battle for the pride of their respective towns. Since those two towns housed the only two pokemon labs worthy of getting the Kanto starters from the League, the rivalry had grown quite strong over the years.

"Yes, because Ardanna was the epitome of charm and grace," Fred said sarcastically. Gertrude's charizard was famous in Orpiment for being one of the most volatile pokemon around. She only showed her soft side to her trainer's family and their pokemon, but even then it always took her a while to accept any new additions.

"Where's Jared?" Marcus asked, eager to receive his gift. Jared had just turned twenty the week before. He had previously worked as a technician for the Indigo Plateau, but now that he and his wife, Sandy, had received their Breeder's Licenses, they were opening up a ranch in Viridian.

"Upstairs, sleeping in," Gertrude said, scowling slightly. "That boy sleeps far too much, if you ask me."

"I'll wake him up," Marcus volunteered, scooping Ignigena up and dashing upstairs. He checked Jared's room, looking forward to scaring his brother awake, but was disappointed to find Jared already up and typing away at his computer.

"A cyndaquil!" Jared exclaimed. "Fantastic! I've only ever seen its evolved forms before."

"Her name is Ignigena," Marcus said as the pokemon in question sniffed speculatively at Jared's offered hand before bumping against it with her head.

"Awfully affectionate, isn't she?" Jared asked.

"Yeah, probably more than any of the others' starters," Marcus said without embarrassment.

"Will you have the heart to send her into battle?" Jared asked. It was a legitimate question. Most of the trainers that didn't make it quit because they couldn't bear to see their pokemon hurt.

"She's tougher than she looks," Marcus said, secretly hoping his words were true.

"She is, but you don't sound like you believe it," Jared said. "Have faith in your pokemon. They're all tough, and they're almost always looking to battle, even in the wild. Try and remember that."

"I will," Marcus said, looking down at Ignigena, who seemed to have tuned out the conversation. He wondered if it was an act.

"But hey, enough introspective bullshit," Jared said, smiling in an effort to cheer his younger brother up. "I got you something, what say we go and get it."

Marcus brightened immediately. "What is it?"

"A surprise within a surprise," Jared said cryptically, leading Marcus downstairs. Their parents had adjourned to the den, but Fred wasn't sitting in his favorite chair, and he had his hands behind his back.

"What've you got, Dad?" Marcus asked slowly, looking to Jared for confirmation.

"The first of many, but it's the only one you should expect for free," his brother explained, motioning for their father to pull out the mystery gift from behind his back. Marcus' eyes bugged out when he recognized it as an egg.

"It's enormous!" he breathed, running forward to take it. It had a yellowish tint to it when his father had held it, but upon closer inspection, it was pure white. He turned to Jared. "What kind of pokemon is inside?"

"That's the second surprise," Jared said. "It won't hatch for a while, so don't get too impatient. Just keep it warm and don't start throwing it off of cliffs. The egg is tough enough to handle a lot, but not just anything." His expression turned serious. "Pop quiz time, how long after hatching can a pokemon safely battle?"

"A month," Marcus said confidently.

"It's actually a little less than that, but rounding it up to a full month is never a bad idea. Your pokedex will tell you everything else you'll need to know once that thing hatches. Good luck out there, Marc."

"Thanks, Jared," Marcus said, carefully putting his egg down next to Ignigena–who immediately placed a steadying paw on it–and pulled his brother into a hug. His parents joined in a moment later, and Gertrude's eyes were moist when they pulled apart.

"I should go, David and Lily are waiting for me," Marcus said, kneeling down to pick the egg back up.

Another round of goodbye hugs followed, and it only took ten more minutes for Marcus and Ignigena to make it out of the house, the egg tucked safely into Marcus' enormous pack.


	2. Minnow Forest

**Lance's Charges: Kanto**

A/N: Well kids, I made a pretty huge error when writing this chapter. I, for some inexplicable reason, thought that chikorita learned vine whip. However, since it's only a possible egg move, I hope you'll just go along with it. I briefly considered changing the chapter, but Vitisatoris' vines are just too important to remove. You'll see why soon.

As it turns out, I can't write a realistic child. I guess that's why I made them thirteen...

Readers, it's very rare for me to ask you guys for anything, but I'd appreciate a review every now and then. I really would like to know which aspects of this story are good and which are bad. Otherwise I can't really improve, right? So please, drop me a review, even if it's just a sentence or two of encouragement.

**Chapter 2: Minnow Forest**

Not all of the forests in Kanto had designated names, like Viridian, and the large, lush wooded area that surrounded Orpiment was no exception. Still, the town's inhabitants often referred it as Minnow Forest, for all of the young trainers that were forced to make it their first stop.

"I haven't seen a single pokemon yet," Lily complained.

"We're the ones to blame," David said. "It was stupid of us to keep our own pokemon out for as long as we did. All the noise they were making probably scared half the forest away."

"Sorry about that," Marcus said for the second time in less than five minutes. The mischievous Ignigena had been the cause of most of the noise, sneaking up on Apollo and scaring him into making a terrible racket and nearly setting a nearby tree on fire.

"Don't worry about it," David said impatiently. "And when you let Ignigena out again, make sure to let her know we're not mad at her."

Marcus offered David a grateful smile and seemed about to respond, but he never got the chance.

"There!" Lily shouted, pointing at the treetops nearby. "Did you see it?"

"Nope," David said, turning to Marcus only to see the other boy shaking his head in denial as well. "What was it?"

"A mankey, I think," she said, suddenly being very careful not to move. A rustle in the branches directly above them alerted all three to the pokemon in question, but it immediately vanished into the thick growth. "I see it!" Lily exclaimed, taking off like a shot after dropping her backpack to the forest floor.

David locked eyes with Marcus. "Go after her," Marcus said, "I'll keep an eye on your bag."

"Thanks, Marcus," David said, dropping his own pack and sprinting after his friend, one hand resting on Apollo's pokeball. The trees weren't too densely packed, and there were hardly any bushes, so David had little trouble keeping track of Lily, and actually managed to close the distance between them slightly as time wore on. His good luck wasn't meant to last, though, and bad luck took the form of a metapod dropping down right in front of him as he ran. Having nothing better to do, David grabbed it and skidded to a halt, pulling its sticky string down from the tree and onto his head before he could slow down enough.

"Metapod," the pokemon said monotonously. David took a wild guess and thought it might be angry.

"Sorry about that, but I've gotta go," David said, leaning the irritated bug-type against the tree it had fallen from and taking off at a slow jog. He initially found the string almost impossible to tear, but as he increased the distance between himself and the metapod, it seemed to lose most of its strength.

He stopped jogging soon after, realizing that in the heat of the moment, he had completely lost track of Lily. Knowing that her pokedex was in her bag, which was back with Marcus, David might have panicked had he not heard Lily's voice shout something incoherent from nearby.

Racing off to find her, David only had to go a few yards before she was in sight, having been hidden by one of the few dense groups of trees. The sight before him was an interesting one. The mankey–and it was a mankey–had its legs and tail wrapped tightly around a tree branch while its arms were cuffed together by Vitisatoris' vines. Lily was holding her chikorita and helping him pull the mankey slowly down, bending the tree branch more and more.

David was about to say something, but instead decided to go back and watch from behind the trees. This was Lily's fight.

Things took a definite turn for the worse almost immediately after he made his choice, though. The branch finally reached its limit and snapped, the sound echoing all around them and even causing a couple of roosting pidgey to take flight. The mankey was propelled straight at Lily and Vitisatoris at an alarming speed. Seeing that, it pulled at the vines with its arms, causing its body to flip so that its feet were the first thing that would strike them. Lily was able to step partially to the side, but the mankey still bounced off of her shoulder, knocking the girl over.

Luckily, she landed on her back, enabling Vitisatoris to jump up and grab the mankey once again with his vines before it could escape.

"Swing it into the ground, but not near anything it can grab onto," Lily wheezed, having had the air blasted from her lungs by the fall. Vitisatoris obeyed. This time one vine had managed to ensnare both of the mankey's legs, while the other had a firm grip on one arm. It looked a little awkward to see one vine extending several feet beyond the other as the fighting-type's body was smashed brutally against the grassy floor, but it was undeniably effective. Two smashes laid the mankey out, and by then Lily had recovered enough to toss one of her two empty pokeballs at it from her prone position. Even though the mankey was knocked out, the ball shook on the ground several times before coming to rest.

"Ugh, are all of these battles going to be so painful?" Lily asked, giving Vitisatoris a tired smile. "You did great out there, but return for now." The chikorita disappeared into the ball as David joined her in the clearing.

"That was awesome!" He exclaimed, pulling Lily to her feet and helping her brush herself off. "Even better than the battles on TV!"

"You really think so?" Lily asked, blushing from the praise.

"For sure! But I'm a little confused. I thought the pokemon we got from the lab didn't know any special moves yet, how come yours was using vine whip?"

"You know better than that, David," Lily scolded, falling into step with him as he turned back toward where he'd left Marcus. "The vines are a part of Vitis' body, he just doesn't know how to use them to whip things yet."

"Oh, right," David said, inwardly cursing himself for sleeping through one of the days they had spent learning about basic grass-type anatomy.

"I guess it's a good thing you chose a fire-type," Lily teased, leaning into him with increasing pressure as a tree approached, hoping to run him into it. Laughing, David stepped back behind her and only just saved her from falling down.

"Looks like you're more hurt than you let on," he said, giving her back an experimental poke and eliciting a wince. "Sorry."

"Don't be, that spot hit a rock when I fell," Lily said leaning into him again, this time for support.

David thought he had missed a turn at one point during their trek back, but when they came upon the same metapod from earlier, his fears were put to rest.

"So you just left it here?" Lily asked, stifling a giggle as the metapod that now rested in her arms glared at her friend. "Why not just capture it?"

"Thanks but no thanks," David said dryly. He was perched up on the branch that the metapod had fallen from. "It hates me, and I don't really feel like trying to make it change its mind. I'm ready."

"Fair enough," Lily said, shrugging and heaving the pokemon up with all of her strength.

"Metapod," it said in the same monotone, its widened eyes the only indicator of its alarm. David caught it cleanly, though, and was able to hold it against the branch long enough for it to produce more string shot, enough to hang independently.

"We should have used Vitisatoris for that," David remarked after jumping down. "We've been gone for a while, Marcus is probably worried by now."

"He doesn't strike me as the worrying type," Lily said. "Hey, can I see your pokedex for a sec?"

"Sure, what for?"

"Gotta see what this mankey is," she replied as he handed her the device. "Male. I wonder if I'll ever catch a female."

"Eventually," David said, recognizing Lily's lack of concern. She was just making conversation. "What will you name him?"

Lily turned to face him. "You mean what will _you_ name him? I let Marcus name Vitis, so now you get to name this mankey. Make it a good one, some heroic guy with a beautiful wife or something."

"Are you ever going to name your own pokemon?" David asked.

"After this, I'll name them all no matter what you guys suggest. I just think it's weird that my best friend hasn't named one when someone else has, even if he is another friend." Lily looked up at him through her eyelashes. "Please?"

"Of course I'll do it," David said tiredly, turning away from her so he could think. Lily's mention of a beautiful wife had sparked several possibilities in his mind, but there was one hero above all of the others he knew about that valued his wife more than anything. "Odysseus."

"Good one!" Lily said. "I was thinking of him, but I couldn't remember his name."

"Glad I could help out, then," David said. They were getting close to where he had left Marcus.

"So when are you going to catch a pokemon?" Lily asked after a minute's silence, giving her friend a mischievous smile.

"When I see one that I want," David shot back.

"Not waiting for a dragonite, I hope," Lily said.

"No," David said, the mention of his favorite pokemon bringing a slight smile to his face. "But I'll get one eventually."

"You and Ian with your stupid dragon-types," Lily muttered. "Salamence this, dragonite that..."

David rolled his eyes as she trailed off, resisting the temptation to squeeze her injured shoulder.

They found Marcus after another few minutes of walking. He was sitting atop his bag, holding an egg twice the size of his head in his arms. Ignigena was sitting nearby next to a slightly larger-than-average pidgey.

"Where did you get that?" Lily asked, pointing to the egg in his arms.

"My brother gave it to me. He won't tell me what kind of pokemon it is, and I've never seen an egg that's just pure white," Marcus explained patiently.

"It looks pinkish from here," David commented. "Did you catch that pidgey over there?"

"Yeah, it just flew into the clearing and landed on that rock over there. It looked kinda spooked."

"Probably from that branch," David said. At Marcus' questioning look, he told the other boy about Lily's capture, including the pidgey taking off.

"My story isn't so interesting," he said with a laugh. "Ignigena took Aerius here out in a couple of hits and I caught him without much trouble. You guys want to take a break before we go any further?"

"Definitely," Lily said gratefully, pulling away from David and sitting down with a bit of difficulty. "Gonna sit, David?"

"Actually, I think I'm going to go over to where that metapod was. Maybe there are other bug-types around."

Lily made a face. "You really want a bug-type?"

If she were any other girl, David would scold her and insist that bug types weren't gross at all, but he knew that she referred only to the perceived weakness of that specific type. "Not all of them are weak. If pinsir and scizor can get the job done, then I'm sure I could train up one of the others to be that strong."

"Like that metapod?" Lily asked.

"Like just about anything _other_ than that metapod," David asserted. "What do you think, Marcus?"

He shrugged. "I don't like most of them that much, but I don't see how that should affect you."

"The spot is more or less on our way, I think," David said, pointing in a direction that was much more east than south. "You guys wanna just catch up when you're done with your break?"

"Sure," Lily said after getting a nod of confirmation from Marcus. "Go on and catch something cool so you can show it off to your parents when we get to Saffron tomorrow."

David gave them a brief two-fingered salute and jogged off, back on the path he had just left.

While David was happy for both Lily and Marcus, a small part of him was jealous that he hadn't been the one to make the first capture, or even the second. He slowed down when he thought he was close, and it was a good thing that he did. Right on the path he had run earlier, a vileplume's flower could be seen coming up from the ground. Tiny bits of stun spore were floating through the air around it. Pulling out his pokedex, he carefully held it forward until it registered the pokemon and gave it a glance. It was relatively weak, for a vileplume, but it could still kill both him and Apollo without too much effort.

Giving the powerful pokemon a wide berth, David continued on, paying careful attention to his surroundings. He saw another vileplume lying in wait for prey, but it was far enough away from him that he didn't even find it necessary to scan it.

Soon after leaving the second vileplume behind, the tree came into view. This time the metapod was hanging in plain sight, right where he ran into it earlier. Sighing softly, he pulled out his pokedex and sent a message to Marcus and Lily, warning them about the vileplume on the path, something he should have done right after spotting it. With that done, he pocketed his pokedex and left his pack sitting on the ground. The pokemon most well known for stealing was mankey, and after the show Lily put on earlier, he very much doubted that there was another one left in the whole forest.

Even as he was approaching the metapod, David wondered why he was even bothering. It glared balefully at him with its one visible eye and looked about ready to risk using its pathetically slow tackle attack if he continued to bother it. A glance at his pokedex told him that the metapod wasn't going to be evolving anytime soon, so he didn't have to worry about any butterfree attacking him, at least.

"Meta," the pokemon groused threateningly.

"Oh shut up," David said, grabbing onto a low branch with both hands and hoisting himself up into the tree. There didn't appear to be any more pokemon in the tree, aside from a pidgey on the very top branch that seemed to be considering retreat, which didn't interest him much anyway. On an impulse, he looked back to look at the vileplume from before. The first one was too far away to make out, but the second...the second one was no longer alone!

Before he knew it, David was on the ground running as fast as his legs would carry him towards a likely demise, screaming his head off. Logically, he knew that even if he managed to save this weedle, some other innocent pokemon would fall prey to the carnivorous grass-type, but the idea of just watching while such a thing happened turned his stomach. He saw the weedle look up at the source of the shouting, but it must have just inhaled some of the spores, since the poor creature collapsed partially on one of the vileplume's petals.

Like some horrible nightmare, the vileplume's black body emerged from underground and turned to face its victim, hardly paying attention to the screaming trainer headed its way. It contemplated briefly which attack to use to cut the little pokemon into bite-sized pieces. Acid was by far the easiest, but it sometimes burnt away the juiciest bits. Its other option was razor leaf, which it had only learned through its parents, but the vileplume neither knew nor cared about that. It only wanted to eat. It leaned back and shot several cruel-edged leaves towards the helpless creature, but they never hit it. In fact, they passed right through the red light that the weedle had suddenly become.

The vilepulume turned just in time to see the pokeball bounce back into the hands of a boy, who caught it with a steady hand and replaced it on his belt.

David didn't give the pokemon a chance to think. He was running back to his bag as soon as the ball was safely on his belt. There was no time to put it on properly, so instead he cradled it with both arms and ran back on the path, a half-formed idea in his head. The vileplume, which was halfway to the bag when he got to it, tried to close the distance between them, but its little legs were unable to keep up with David's longer strides.

That was before they entered a sunny patch of land. Upon feeling that first ray of rejuvenating light, the vileplume's legs began pumping almost impossibly fast, and suddenly it was gaining on him. David had anticipated this, however, since he knew about vileplume's chlorophyll ability, and knew that he was almost to his destination. Sure enough, right before the forest was once again covered in shade, the other vileplume's flower still emerged from the ground. He ran around it, guessing correctly that his pursuer would be in too much of a hurry to spot its own trap from another source.

Not five steps behind him, the vileplume stumbled directly over its counterpart, but it was moving again a second later, as the stun spore hadn't taken hold. Unfortunately, stun spore was the least of the vileplume's problems, as its counterpart emerged from the ground looking furious. Torn between chasing the boy who had stolen its meal into the shade and dealing with this challenger, the vileplume decided that the newly vacated sunny spot would be a definite upgrade. All it had to do now was bump its challenger to another territory. Grinning evilly, the vileplume stalked towards its furious opponent.

* * *

At first, neither Lily nor Marcus could figure out what David was shouting about as he approached them. Marcus' first instinct was to assume he and Lily were being told to run as well, but an experience with an angry sandslash taught Lily that David's gestures in that sort of situation were very different.

"Holy shit," David breathed as he reached them, dropping his bag and collapsing on top of it. "If either of you sees a vileplume, let me know and then run for your lives."

"What are you talking about?" Lily asked, nudging David with her foot.

"I'll tell you later," David said, his voice muffled by his arm.

Marcus put down his pack and sighed. "Looks like we're taking another break."

* * *

Lily and Marcus agreed to give David half an hour to rest, but they hadn't counted on the additional fifteen minutes it took just to rouse him. By the time they were moving again (this time almost due south), Marcus was complaining that they might not even make it to Saffron before nightfall of the following day at the rate they were going.

"Theseus seems to like you a lot," Lily commented, smiling slightly as the bug pokemon crawled up and down David's torso while they walked, sometimes even going upside-down under his arms.

"Gratitude tends to lead towards affection," Marcus said. "And as if saving his life wasn't enough, he followed it up with a nice cheri berry."

"What pokemon could possibly resist?" David asked with a grin, scratching Theseus around its horn.

"I'm sure I could come up with a few," Lily said dryly. She still hadn't released Odysseus from his pokeball.

"Jealous?" Marcus quipped. Aerius was nestled comfortably on his shoulder, and appeared to be sleeping, if his rhythmic breathing was any indicator.

"Not really, Vitisatoris likes me just fine," Lily maintained.

"And so will Odysseus once you let him out," David insisted.

"I know, it's just..." Lily paused, unable to find the words.

"When you were battling him, he looked furious at you, right?" Marcus asked, recalling his conversation earlier with his brother.

"Yeah," Lily replied.

"And then you ordered Vitisatoris to hurt him, badly, right?"

Lily nodded shakily.

"And so now you're worried that he'll still look at you the way he did, treat you like an enemy. Or worse yet, you're worried you deserve it." It wasn't a question.

"How do you know all of that?" Lily asked. She looked about ready to cry.

"My brother said it might happen to us," Marcus said simply.

"Did he say anything about what to do about it?" David asked.

"Not a lot, he just told me to remember that pokemon battle each other in the wild all the time, it's instinctual. They'd probably be fighting even if we weren't there. Our job is to look out for our own, and to try and keep the wild ones from getting hurt too bad by anything we might encounter."

Lily smiled. It was a small, tremulous smile, but it was a step in the right direction. "Thanks, Marcus."

David wanted to say something, to offer Marcus his own thanks, but one look at Lily's fragile state told him that he was better off clamming up for now. Still, he hoped that Marcus knew how happy he was that all three of them were traveling together. He wouldn't have been able to snap Lily out of that. While he knew her better than anyone, he wouldn't have understood the problem in time without Marcus there.

"Thanks, Marcus," he echoed as they kept walking, his whisper breaking apart in the slight breeze and not even making it to his own ears.

* * *

"It's getting dark," David said unnecessarily, pulling out Apollo's pokeball and sending him out. Theseus looked curiously at the newcomer while Aerius swept its head under its wing to block out the additional light.

"Think we should get all of our pokemon out?" Lily asked nervously. David couldn't blame her for being a bit frightened, the fire from Apollo's tail lengthened the shadows around them and made the forest that wasn't reached by the light seem far more sinister than it should.

"No, but it's definitely time to start looking for someplace to make camp," Marcus said. "Want to split up?"

"We've only got the one light source," Lily pointed out. "There are ways around that, but none of them are nearly as easy as sticking together."

"I'm all for that as well, to be honest," David said. "Maybe we'll start splitting up once we've gotten used to the wilderness, but until then, we should keep close after dark."

"I can agree with that," Marcus said, deciding not to bring up his flashlight as a possible alternate light source. He didn't want to split up either, and had immediately regretted the suggestion.

So, they continued moving. There wasn't much of a trail, just a thin, unmarked path of grass that was discolored from countless individuals walking over it.

"There's a clearing up ahead," Lily whispered, spotting it seconds before either Marcus or David were able to. "But something's moving..." she trailed off and, once Charmander had reached the edge of the clearing, began retching violently. David and Marcus were each only barely able to keep from doing the same. Ahead of them was a pokemon carcass, a big one, at that. If any of them had been looking carefully, they might have recognized the skeletal structure of an arcanine. Instead, they were busy watching the nine rattata gnawing away at the few bits of remaining flesh.

"Time to find a new campsite," David said, coughing into his arm in a vain attempt to block the putrid odor.

"Too late," Marcus said. He was right. Rattata, being primarily nocturnal, were very sensitive to light, so Apollo's flame was like a beacon to them. What was worse, it was an unwelcome beacon.

"Send everyone out!" David called, but his command was a waste of time. Ignigena, Vitisatoris and Odysseus all emerged, the mankey looking extremely confused. Not having any time to waste, Lily bent down to whisper into his ear while waving at Vitisatoris to help Apollo, who was being surrounded by four of them.

"String shot!" David ordered, and Theseus did his job to perfection from his perch on David's shoulder. Three of the rattata slowed noticeably, but there were still many more. Apollo and Vitisatoris were grappling with two each, and meeting with moderate success. Ignigena and Aerius were doing very well against single opponents, but that left two rattata unchecked. One of them jumped at David, knocking Theseus down to the ground, while the other suddenly found itself defending against a furious Odysseus.

It was bedlam. Each trainer barked rapid-fire orders at his or her pokemon and didn't even have time to check to make sure that the orders were being followed. A well-aimed poison sting from Theseus hit the rattata that had gone after him, but the other three were speeding up. David took matters into his own hands and kicked one of them clear across the clearing. It bounced a couple of times before coming to a stop, but then it was on its feet again and advancing towards Odysseus, who was closest.

Lily saw what was about to happen, though, and ordered her mankey to swing its current opponent around behind him and into the newcomer. She was too far away to hear the soft thump of flesh hitting flesh, but she knew that the attack had been worthwhile when one of them came away with a slight limp.

David pulled his leg back to kick a second rattata when the third jumped onto his calf and bit down. Hard. The leg buckled and he let out a cry of pain, only just having the presence of mind to swat away the second rattata's attempts to get at his face. He felt a slight breeze rush over his face and realized that his opposition had just been halved. A look around revealed Aerius hovering over its new opponent, its previous foe lying sprawled and unconscious on the other side of the clearing. Turning his attention back to the one trying to gnaw off his leg, David grabbed it by the scruff of the neck with one hand and forced its jaws open with the other. He barely pulled his hand away in time to avoid being bitten again. Growing impatient with the pokemon, David shook it violently and then punted it twice as far as the kicked one had gone. He didn't see where it had fallen, but doubted that it wouldn't rejoin the fight.

Apollo and Vitisatoris, meanwhile, had been doing all they could just to keep their opponents at bay. The charmander grappled with one and kept his tail in the other's face. It meant that he couldn't attack all that effectively, but he had only received a couple of scratches for his trouble, and the rattata were, if anything, tiring faster than he was. Vitisatoris had been using one vine on each foe, usually just tripping them up while remaining out of reach himself. His job had become much easier after he managed to poke one in the eye, but he still couldn't risk getting close enough to use an attack, and individually, his vines couldn't realistically do that much damage to separate foes.

Having fully recovered from his fall, Theseus lunged forward and landed another poison sting in the rattata's face, shattering the pokemon's last remaining shred of confidence. It fled as soon as it could and Theseus began to blanket Vitisatoris' foes with string shot at David's behest.

"Ignigena, help out Odysseus at the far end! He can't grapple with two at once," Marcus called finally risking a glance at his friends. They seemed to be back in control, the momentary panic of such a chaotic battle having subsided. Lily had been coaching back and forth between Vitisatoris and Odysseus, but now she focused all of her attention on the mankey, seeing that Theseus was going to be there to aid her chikorita momentarily. David was shouting orders, helping his charmander through the tough fight while trying to step over Vitisatoris' vines to help out physically. Marcus knew, as David and Lily both did, that trainers were not, strictly speaking, supposed to interfere in a battle so directly. Still, this had been a desperate situation. Had he been closer to David, he would have helped him fight off the ones that attacked him earlier.

A loud thump echoed in the clearing as Odysseus slammed his foe into the skull of the arcanine, knocking it out. He immediately jumped on top of the back of another rattata–the one that Apollo had been holding at bay with his tail–and began to pummel it from above with all five of his limbs.

Apollo used his sudden freedom to his advantage, pushing his foe back before firmly shoving his tail flame into the pokemon's face. The rattata squealed in pain and surprise, temporarily drawing the attention of all of the other fighters. It scampered away hastily after that, and all of the remaining rattata that could move freely followed it as quickly as they could.

"Everyone ok?" David asked, sitting down and motioning for Apollo and Theseus to join him.

"Everyone but you," Lily observed, pointing his leg out to Marcus.

"Your injury is the worst out of any of us, none of the pokemon got anything worse than a few scratches," Marcus said, looking slightly ill at the sight of the blood running down David's leg.

"Odysseus and Apollo got the worst of it, besides you," Lily said, squinting at each of the pokemon in turn. "Just a few scratches, really, they all seem ok."

"They'll all be pretty beat in the morning, though," David said, briefly toying with Theseus' pokeball before recalling him. "Sorry Apollo, but we still need you to help us make camp for the night."

Marcus recalled Aerius, citing poor night vision as the cause, but the rest of the pokemon remained out.

"So what do you think killed that arcanine?" Marcus asked, breaking the silence.

"Old age, hopefully," Lily said.

David stayed silent. He hadn't thought anything of it when he had first spotted the skeleton, but there had been several cracks on the arcanine's skull, as well as on a few of the other big bones he had seen. One thing that he was fairly sure had _not_ killed the large fire-type was old age.

"Key!" came the call from above, startling everyone but Lily, who had told Odysseus to search a nearby area. He led them to a fire pit, one that hadn't been used in a while, but was still clearly functional. Lily and Marcus started gathering firewood while the pokemon looked for berries and other things nearby that might be edible.

An hour later, they were all asleep, having eaten their fill of freshly picked berries. There had been a few mushrooms as well, but even the pokemon seemed leery about eating them, so their trainers had decided against it as well.


	3. Advantage, Catherine

**Lance's Charges**

A/N: Still no reviews. Disappointing, but not entirely unexpected. Like I said before, I'm writing this story for me, so I'll keep posting them as I write them.

**Chapter 3: Advantage, Catherine**

"Karina, duck and scratch above you!"

Catherine's totodile obeyed, dropping to her belly under the male nidoran's attack, blindly swiping above her with both claws. One made contact, drawing a thin line of blood down the poison-type's left side, but it would take more than that to finish him.

As soon as the nidoran landed, he repeated the attack, hitting Karina squarely in the back as she tried to rise, not having heard Catherine's order to roll to one side before attempting to stand. As a result, the air was blasted from her lungs, but Catherine's next order was loud enough to be heard. Rising to her feet, Karina saw that the nidoran was breathing heavily, but still clearly confident that he would win the battle.

"Karina, you can do this! Make dodging your priority; don't let him hit you again. Whenever you can, scratch him," Catherine said calmly. Her composure didn't seem to be shaken, but her eyes told a different story.

Madison had never seen such a wild look in those ice-blue eyes in her life. Catherine already loved the thrill of a pokemon battle, she could tell. Unfortunately, for the first time in Madison's memory, her friend had let emotions cloud her judgment, which wasn't good. Catherine excelled at strategizing because she was normally able to stay completely calm. However, she hadn't even thought to take her pokedex out and look at the nidoran's available statistics before charging into battle. While not insurmountable, the nidoran did have a distinct advantage over Karina in the level department, and it showed. Even Ian, who admitted to everyone that he wasn't particularly smart when it came to planning, seemed appalled by Catherine's lack of preparation for the battle.

The nidoran broke into a trot, gradually increasing his speed as he approached the tense totodile. This time, he clearly expected her to duck, because he hardly jumped at all vertically, making his attack that much quicker as a result. That turned out to be exactly what Karina was counting on, though.

Using the strongest pair of legs that any region's standard starting pokemon possessed, Karina coiled and sprang up into the air, rolling over at the apex of her jump and swiping out with both claws, catching the surprised nidoran _inside_ of his ears. The helpless poison-type began a slow spin backwards as he descended, skidding onto his haunches instead of landing smoothly. Blood trickled out of both ears and the nidoran suddenly seemed unable to stand steadily. Nidoran, particularly the males, counted on their superior hearing more than almost any other pokemon. The battle was over.

Her smile as wide as Madison had ever seen it; Catherine tossed a pokeball over at the nidoran, letting out a soft sigh of relief as the light on the ball went out after only one significant shake. "You were spectacular, Karina," Catherine said, recalling her water-type.

"I thought you were toast!" Ian exulted, walking forward and shaking her hand forcefully. He was wearing a new hat from his mother, a black one decorated with a picture of a salamence. "Great work in the end, though, I don't know if Njord and I could have won against that one."

"The pokedex said that he was considerably stronger than Karina in every category except defense and hit points," Madison said, her face breaking out into a grin to match Catherine's. "But hey, all's well that ends well, right?"

"It sure is," Catherine said, bending over to pick up the nidoran's pokeball. "I think his name will be Blake, what do you two think about that?"

"Oh, I love it!" Madison squealed.

"Sounds ok to me," Ian said. "I've got a couple of potions to spare if you want to let him out and heal those ears."

"Thanks, but I'll use my own," Catherine replied, flashing Ian a smile and releasing her new pokemon. Blake immediately perked up and winced, having tried to move his ears to better listen to his surroundings. Catherine bent down and sprayed one ear, making soft, soothing noises as Blake hissed and backed away from her. Potions were painful when applied directly to wounds, but they sped the healing process up exponentially.

"I know it stings, but it'll help, I promise," Catherine cooed, pulling the unresisting nidoran around so she could spray his other ear. His hiss was much less audible this time. "Want me to spray your side, Blake?" The pokemon locked eyes with her before obediently turning and presenting his other injury to her. The blood had dried onto his fur, but one spray from the potion had it running off immediately.

"You'll heal better in your pokeball," Catherine said apologetically, recalling Blake.

"Good bedside manner," Madison said approvingly as Ian handed Catherine her pack.

"That's not exactly what it was," Catherine said, smiling ruefully.

The group had had even less luck than their friends to the south in terms of finding pokemon. They had been walking for the better part of four hours and Blake was the first–and only–that any of them had seen so far.

"Did any of you expect it to be like this?" Ian asked.

"Like what?" Madison said.

"So boring! We're supposed to be meeting other trainers and fighting wild pokemon all over the place! I haven't even seen another person yet."

"I expected it," Catherine said. Now that the excitement from the battle had worn off, she was back to her usual calm, cool and collected self. "We're in the northern part of the forest, which is the least dense area, so there are fewer wild pokemon. Setting that aside, almost no one goes to and from Orpiment, and that's really the only reason to pass through this forest at all. Once we get on the route between Cerulean and Saffron, then we can expect to fight more trainers _and_ pokemon."

"What about people traveling directly from Celadon to Cerulean and vice versa?" Madison asked.

"There's a road that goes around the edge of the forest that all of the cars take, and most trainers find it easier to go around it than to go through. Then again, most of them don't know about our town."

"Any idea how long it'll be until we reach the main route?" Ian asked.

"I've never gone this way before, but Marcus went with his brother once and said it didn't even take a full day of walking to get through the forest. Then all we have to do is cut east when we get to the grasslands," Catherine said. The young trainers all knew that they could check their pokedex map function to see exactly where they were, but that would take away some of the fun of the journey. There would be plenty of time for practicality later.

"Why not just go directly northeast?" Madison asked.

"Think about it, Madison," Ian said. "It means less time in the forest and more time where there are a lot more wild pokemon around. Even if it makes our road to Cerulean take a bit longer, I'd say it's time well spent, right?"

"Yeah, I'm just really eager to get to the city," Madison said. "But there's really no point in getting there until Lopia is strong enough to challenge the gym."

"You can't challenge the gym with Lopia alone," Catherine pointed out.

"What? Why?" Madison asked.

"Gym leaders must be allowed to set the terms of battle after being challenged, that includes choosing how many pokemon can be used. Trainers have to have at least two to give the gym leaders that choice," Catherine said.

"No way! I could've sworn the first gym challenge for any trainer was an exception to that," Madison argued.

"I don't think there are any exceptions," Catherine said, shaking her head.

"Damn, looks like I need to catch something before we get there," Madison said, sounding oddly glum at the prospect of adding to her team.

"Something wrong with the pokemon out here?" Ian asked without a hint of malice. He didn't understand why a trainer with only one pokemon wouldn't want to catch another.

"Not really," Madison said. "I just thought I could catch something in that area north of the city, that's all. There are abra over there."

"Doesn't mean you can't catch something on the way," Ian pointed out. "There are a lot of different kinds in this area."

Madison shrugged. "Yeah, I guess. I was just so focused on abra, you know? But you're right, I'm being ridiculous."

"You _were_," Catherine corrected, smirking at her friend. "But look on the bright side, I think I can see the end of the forest up ahead."

"Race you!" With that shared cry, the three trainers dashed ahead as quickly as they could with their cumbersome packs. Ian, who was the strongest, and had been practicing running with his pack for weeks, quickly pulled ahead of the other two, who were fairly close together. Though she was very graceful, Catherine had never been much of a runner, but her longer legs still allowed her to keep pace with the more athletic Madison.

They weren't a bit disappointed with the image before them when they finally exited the forest. Tall grass stretched for miles and miles ahead of them. Cerulean wasn't visible yet, but the mountains beyond it were, despite looking like mere shadows on the sky from so far away. As soon as Ian reached the grass, a flock of pidgey took off not ten feet in front of him. Watching them, he would have missed a pair of doduo running over the hill just east of them had Madison not elbowed him and pointed them out.

It was, in a word, amazing. Not only could they see farther than they had ever been able to before, but the sheer number of pokemon that were literally _everywhere_ was staggering.

"Yeah, I was being really ridiculous," Madison said.

"Completely," Ian agreed.

"Dunno about you two, but I'm going to go find something to battle!" Madison enthused, preparing herself for another sprint.

"Wait," Catherine said, pulling out her pokedex and checking the map. She was clearly fighting a losing battle to keep her own excitement at bay. "We should make a plan before anyone goes off alone. Let's agree to meet in two hours about a mile east of here, does that sound ok?"

"Yeah, and anyone who needs help shouldn't hesitate to jet out an email to the other two," Madison suggested. "Two of us only have one pokemon, and both of yours are injured, Catherine. Anything can happen."

"Ok, let's go!" Ian said, his enthusiasm matching Madison's. He took off almost directly north, which meant he'd be walking the farthest of the three in the end.

Madison and Catherine's eyes met. "I'm going along the forest," Catherine said. "You ok with going northeast?"

"It's all the same, really," Madison said, jogging backwards and waving. "See you soon!"

Catherine grinned. She fully intended to have another pokemon captured by the time she saw them next, but only if she crossed paths with a suitable one.

Her plan, if it could really be called one, was simple. Both the forest and the plains had their share of pokemon far stronger than the majority. She (correctly) believed that most of those strong pokemon tended towards the center area of each, while the weakest stayed on the borders between areas, hoping to be able to flee from one to the other as needed. Since Catherine's pokemon were fairly weak, she figured that her best chance of finding pokemon close to their level was along the border.

While she was right, it meant that her encounters would be few and far between, at least when compared with her friends.

* * *

"Go for it, Njord!" Ian called, pointing at an unsuspecting rattata. His squirtle obeyed, smirking slightly and leaping at the rattata in a tackle attack.

Ian wasn't sure if it was luck or skill on the rattata's part, but its tail whip came at just the right time with just the right amount of force to divert Njord face first into the ground. Furious, the squirtle responded with a stronger tackle, one that sent the poor rattata several feet into the air. After landing, the normal-type immediately fled.

"Good work, Njord," Ian said, smirking slightly.

"Squirt," Njord put in, clapping one hand against his chestplate. When his trainer wasn't looking, he spat out a mouthful of dirt.

"You'll learn bubble in no time at all, at this rate!" Ian said enthusiastically. "C'mon, let's go see what else is out there."

Njord grinned and followed his trainer, his confidence high after such an easy fight. Still, he knew he'd have to be more careful, a similar fall against a more powerful opponent could mean a quick knockout. Speaking of...

"Spear!"

"Get into your shell!" Ian shouted, seeing the spearow only seconds before it would strike.

Njord looked at his trainer helplessly, not having learned to withdraw yet. Turning his head allowed him to see out of the corner of his eye, though, and he was able to throw himself onto his back and just barely avoid the dive-bombing bird pokemon. A strong tail whip flipped him over to his stomach, and from there Njord was able to rise in time to prepare for the spearow's next sweep.

Ian had no idea what the spearow thought it was doing, going after a pokemon it had nothing to gain from beating. Maybe they were in its perceived territory.

"Njord, be ready to hit it with your tail whip the next time you dodge," Ian said, receiving a nod from his squirtle in response. The spearow swooped in again, but this time Njord was fully prepared. Even as he ducked to one side, he shifted most of his weight to maximize the impact of his tail and smashed it into one of the spearow's wings, sending it skidding into the ground. Njord noted with no small amount of satisfaction that it wasn't the one eating dirt in this fight.

The spearow hopped to its feet a moment later and looked behind it, gaining some resolve in the process, it seemed, because when it turned back around its feathers were puffed up in an attempt at intimidation.

Ian now thought he had figured out what the problem was. He pulled out his pokedex and walked up on top of a small mound of rocks nearby to get a better view. Sure enough his pokedex told him that the spearow was young, and hadn't hatched more than two months earlier. From his new vantage point, Ian saw a nest cunningly hidden within the tall grass, surrounded by rocks large enough that a spearow couldn't hope to move them.

"Njord, stop," Ian said, seeing that his squirtle was about to attack again. "It's just protecting its siblings. And we don't want to be here when its parents arrive."

"Squirt?" Njord asked questioningly, moving away from the angry spearow and towards its trainer.

"Do you want to fight a fearow?" Ian asked pointedly, taking some relief from the fact that the spearow's feathers were gradually returning to their normal position.

Njord wisely didn't answer. As he turned to walk with his trainer, his foot caught on something and he fell forward, barely catching himself in time. Looking down to see what had tripped him up, Njord couldn't find anything.

"You ok?" Ian asked, helping his squirtle up. As the pair continued moving, they didn't notice a small pokemon carefully slip out from behind the rock pile Ian had jumped on earlier and begin to follow them.

* * *

"You know, you really should listen to me. I can help you," Madison said, amusement laced in her tone.

Lopia was fighting blindly, stinging sand in her eyes from the pidgey's opening attack. Madison had sent her out to go after a meowth, but the bulbasaur didn't want to obey a single order from her trainer, so she went after a better prepared pidgey, and was now paying the price for not listening to Madison's battle orders. She was a smart girl, so ignoring every order she gave meant doing something quite stupid more often than not.

"Bulba!" Lopia spat, aiming for where she heard the rustle of wings, though it was actually the grass nearby moving together in the wind. She wasn't even able to land safely before the pidgey had bowled her over, chirping gleefully.

Madison sighed. At this rate she'd never catch another pokemon. Fortunately, losing seemed to be helping her bulbasaur get stronger, if nothing else. After one particularly frustrating miss, a seed emerged from the bulb atop Lopia's back and shot forward at an alarming rate, slamming uselessly into a nearby rock. The pidgey, of course, took advantage of that to attack once more, sending Lopia spinning to the ground again.

"Let me tell you where to aim!" Madison called. Lopia grunted in acknowledgement, having taken enough punishment for one day. "It's coming in on your left, a bit higher than my head, but it's coming straight at you!"

Another seed left Lopia's bulb, this one going a little slower, but somewhat higher than the last. As if sensing the pidgey, a pair of vines hatched from the seed as it traveled, latching onto the pidgey's wing and bringing it to the ground. Bulbasaur, meanwhile, suddenly stood straighter. Madison saw a couple of her scrapes heal over completely. The shift in momentum proved to be just what Lopia needed. Between rapidly clearing vision and the thump that the pidgey had made when it hit the ground, Lopia had no trouble finding it and delivering a devastating tackle as it tried to rise. The pidgey flew through the air, recovered before it hit the ground, and took flight in the opposite direction, shaking off the leech seed as it flew.

Lopia sauntered over to her trainer once she was certain the pidgey wouldn't return, looking tired but extremely pleased with herself.

"You know, I thought you'd listen to me after I recalled you at home, I thought we had an agreement," Madison said, sitting down where she stood.

Lopia snorted.

"What about now?" Madison asked. Lopia seemed uncertain, so she took the offensive. "My parents gave me a nest ball, so I can probably catch something out here without your help. If you don't want me to use you, I don't really have to."

The bulbasaur didn't seem to like that very much, but was still reluctant to make the first move.

"Come on, Lopia, you know we'd make a great team," Madison wheedled.

"Saur," Lopia conceded, and immediately wished she hadn't as Madison stood up and did a ridiculous victory dance.

Rolling her eyes, Lopia spotted her first leech seed still lying on the ground where it had landed. After a few minutes had elapsed, the seed would no longer latch onto anything it touched. Now, however, it was like a potion in pill form. Lopia quickly trotted over and swallowed it in one bite, grimacing at the taste.

"You need your rest for now," Madison said, recalling the bulbasaur. "Hopefully we'll get into another battle soon."

She crested the top of a hill minutes later, and found an even more breathtaking view in front of her. It seemed as though there were only a few hills near the forest, since the plains for miles ahead of her appeared perfectly flat. At the base of the hill, a shallow stream flowed, its water reflecting the waning sun. Madison checked her pokedex, but it had only been an hour.

Giving into one of her childish impulses, Madison tossed her pack ahead of her and rolled down the hill, only managing to stop a few feet short of the stream. It was too shallow to house any water pokemon, which she would have been tempted to search for, but her trip down had scared a couple of sandshrew away.

Madison knelt down to refill her canteen and looked out in front of her. Though it was still very bright outside, a few pokemon could be seen going back to their dens or nests, while others hoped to catch them unawares. She couldn't help but laugh when a wild ekans' ambush was foiled by a doduo stepping on its tail.

"Catch anything interesting?"

She nearly jumped out of her skin, so great was her surprise. As it was, her shriek sent any and all nearby hidden pokemon scurrying away. Behind her was a boy who was perhaps a year or two older than her. He was tall and thin, with fairly long dark hair, and while he wasn't particularly handsome, his face had a strange sort of identity to it that Madison would have found hard to describe. Everything about him was angular, from his long, thin fingers to his sharp nose and chin. His eyes were gray, and a little tired.

It took her a couple of seconds to remember that he had asked her a question. "Um, no, not really. I'm...looking for something special."

"On your first capture?"

Madison felt a flicker of suspicion at that. "How do you know I'm just starting out?"

The boy laughed, dispelling most of her concerns. "Not too many veterans will roll down a hill like that anymore, and fewer still will shriek when surprised."

"Fair enough," Madison said. "So does that make you a veteran?"

"Not really," he said, laughing again. "I have a couple of pokemon that are pretty strong, but I just caught one here that isn't too tough. Care to battle it?"

Madison made a face. "How do I know I'm not being hustled?"

The boy opened his arms wide in mock surrender. "We don't have to put up any money if you don't want to. I'll even revive your pokemon if you lose with my own items, so there's literally nothing to lose, how does that sound?"

"You're going to an awful lot of trouble just to battle me," Madison said, but she was smiling.

"Yeah, well I feel like I owe a couple of experienced trainers that helped me out when I was new," he explained. "Think of this as me paying it forward."

"Ok, I guess we can battle, then," Madison said. "Go on and send out your pokemon, I've only got the one to choose from anyway."

"Sure you do," the boy said, giving her an exaggerated wink. "Well, here we go!" He tossed out a pokeball, and Madison was surprised when the red light that burst forth formed into a cubone. She had been expecting something a bit less common, but the species _had_ been growing increasingly scarce over the past few years.

"Ok, Lopia," Madison whispered into the ball. "Let's take this guy down!" With that, she threw the ball, releasing her bulbasaur. Their issues from before were forgotten; she saw it in her pokemon's eyes. Even though Lopia knew nothing of the nature of the challenge, her thirst to prove that she and her trainer were superior overrode any lingering misgivings she might have had.

"Cubone, use bone club!" The little pokemon dashed forward with astonishing speed, but Lopia was ready for it. A pair of vines wrapped around the bone in its hand. However, cubone's grip was far too strong to be broken, so she did the next best thing. Up in the air went the cubone, and then down again, but its skull protected it from most of the impact. It acted as though it hadn't felt a thing, wrenching its bone from Lopia's vines with surprising strength before beginning another charge.

"Leech seed!" Madison called. For the third time that day, a small brown seed shot from her bulb, this one traveling as fast as the original shot had.

"Swat it away!" the boy called, and the cubone tried, but it missed the seed when it swung, and was wrapped in life-draining vines a second later.

"Lopia, see if you can grab its weapon!"

"Hold on tight, Cubone, it'll be weak enough for you to break through soon!"

The leech seed continued to absorb energy from the prone ground-type while Lopia's remaining scrapes and bruises from earlier were fully healed. She sent her vines to grab the bone, but the cubone managed to hold on.

"Forget it, just tackle it!" Madison shouted, not seeing the smirk on her opponent's face. As Lopia approached the cubone, it flexed, finally snapping the tight hold the leech seed had on it just in time. When Lopia leaped, the cubone smashed the side of her head with its bone, opening up a shallow cut on her cheek. Lopia's momentum couldn't be stopped by the attack, though, and the cubone was hit right in the stomach. Both pokemon were on their feet a second later, each one looking slightly worse for the collision.

"Bone club, but watch out for the vines!" the boy called out. At such a low level, his move options were limited, so a lot depended on the cubone's dodging.

"Grab it by the skull this time!" Madison said, smiling grimly.

Even as the cubone approached its foe, it was afraid. Lopia looked especially intimidating with blood slowly trickling down the side of her face, and the vines that had suddenly attached themselves to its skull behind its eyes weren't helping any. It beat the vines with its bone, but while they could be cut, they couldn't be bruised, and the vines of a grass-type didn't have any nerves.

"Pry them loose, quick before they swing you down!" the boy shouted. The cubone obeyed, diligently sticking its bone between its skull and each vine and prying them loose as quickly as possible. Lopia was relatively low level, so its task was an easy one. Unfortunately, even if it was an improvement over being slammed into the ground from thirty feet, a straight drop from the same height was far from ideal. The cubone screamed in fear as it fell.

"Catch it," Madison said, and Lopia obediently sent her vines forward, intercepting the cubone ten feet up before letting it down gently. "I think that means I win."

He smiled slightly and recalled his cubone. "I think it does, too. Thanks for saving it."

"It? Don't you know what gender it is? How else can you give it...?" Madison trailed off when she realized that he had been calling it "Cubone" during the battle.

"Uh, yeah, I don't have a pokedex or any other way to tell," he said, looking furious with himself.

"Well I've got a pokedex, so we can find out what gender it is if you want," Madison offered.

He looked conflicted for a moment before nodding his agreement. "No fair trying to name it, though, it's for my little cousin, so it's her job to name it." He looked unhappy, probably because he didn't want to give it up, Madison realized.

She pulled out her pokedex. "Bring it closer, this thing can't read pokeballs unless they're right by it. Ok, it's a girl, just like Lopia." She looked up at him. He was smiling, but it looked a little bit like a grimace.

"Thanks," the boy said, shaking his head and apparently releasing his negative feelings as he did. When he faced her again, his smile appeared genuine. "What's your name?"

"Madison Carr," she said, matching his smile. "What's–"

"You aren't traveling alone, are you?" he asked, interrupting her question.

"No, me and my friends just split up to hunt for pokemon," Madison said.

The boy nodded. "Well, Madison, it's been fun. You'll have to tell me about your friends the next time we see each other."

"You can meet them," Madison said. The rest of his statement caught up to her a second later. "Wait, you're leaving? I don't even know your name!"

"That's ok, we'll see each other again, I'm sure of it. Until then!" Madison hadn't noticed before, but smoke had been building up around the boy, and when he finished his farewell and stepped back, it was like he'd never been there in the first place. She thought she heard the grass rustle to her left, but when she turned there, there was nothing. When the smoke cleared, she and Lopia were alone by the stream.

"That was weird," Madison said, turning to her bulbasaur, who was looking back up the hill. "Think we'll actually see him again?"

"Bulba," Lopia said indifferently.

"Yeah, it doesn't really matter right now. We should go meet up with Catherine and Ian, we've still got a bit of a walk ahead of us to get to the meeting place."

Lopia fell into step beside her trainer, wishing she had managed to use leech seed one last time on the boy's cubone. Still, the cut would heal.

* * *

"This was such a stupid idea," Catherine growled, stomping furiously towards the agreed upon meeting place. Karina and Blake had made great strides in their battling, but she had yet to fight a single pokemon that was interesting enough to warrant capturing. She had been tempted by a female nidoran, but that wouldn't have made for a very versatile team. A barking sound from behind her halted her in her tracks.

As she turned, a panicked caterpie fled as quickly as it could towards the safety that only a tree could provide. Unfortunately, caterpie wasn't known for its speed. As Catherine watched, the source of the bark became apparent when a growlithe came bounding out of the tall grass, looking extremely pleased with itself. It jumped directly into the path of the caterpie pawing at it playfully.

The caterpie wasn't amused.

Catherine pulled Karina's pokeball out as quietly as she could and double-tapped it open. The growlithe turned at the slight sound that came from the pokeball. The change in its demeanor was noticeable. It nudged the caterpie out of the way with its snout and faced Karina looking fairly serious, though the slight sparkle remained in its eyes. Having won once without it, Catherine felt no uneasiness about checking her pokedex, and found that the growlithe was male, and that it matched up fairly evenly against Karina, who had more or less caught up to Blake during the day.

"Ok, Karina, let's take this one nice and slow," Catherine said easily. She now knew what, in general, to expect from her totodile, making battles a lot less nerve-wracking.

Karina did exactly what she was told to do, and waited for her opponent to make the first move. She was bouncing eagerly on the balls of her feet, though.

Finally, the growlithe barked impatiently and ran forward to attack. Karina stopped bouncing and prepared to spring to one side and avoid the predictable bite. However, the growlithe skidded to a halt a couple of feet away and spat out an ember attack at her, which Karina had no time to dodge.

"Scratch him!" Catherine called, watching with trepidation as her pokemon obliged, her superior legwork allowing her to leave a light scratch on the growlithe's flank. This time, he clearly expected his bite to make contact, but Karina followed up her scratch with a punch that signaled the beginning of her rage attack. The growlithe didn't understand the significance, so he moved ahead anyway and bit into Karina's shoulder, drawing a bit of blood.

Karina's responding blow caused his hind legs to buckle, but he didn't release her shoulder, and the cuts grew. Karina's rage brought her attack higher still and her third punch caused the growlithe to release at last, falling to the ground in defeat. It had been a close call, though. Karina's shoulder looked messy, and Catherine knew she'd either have to give her a potion or keep her in her pokeball until they got to Cerulean.

Catherine threw her last empty pokeball at the prone growlithe, holding her breath until it stopped shaking.

"Good to have you on the team, Donovan," she said, having decided on the nickname sometime during the battle.

Her latest capture taken care of, Catherine knelt down to get a closer look at Karina's shoulder. The wound wasn't deep, but it was quite messy. She rummaged in her bag and found–much to her relief–that she still had three potions left. She allowed Karina to grip one of her fingers as she completely emptied the potion onto the totodile's shoulder, and was surprised at the strength of her grip.

"Time to go meet the others," she said to herself, recalling Karina and continuing east.

* * *

Ian exchanged a weary glance with his squirtle. He and Njord had been in countless battles during the day, winning nearly all of them with ease, but aside from a doduo that was far too strong for them to beat, Ian hadn't seen anything that struck his fancy.

A soft growl from his left was the only indicator he had that his squirtle had fallen once again. Ever since battling the spearow near its nest, Njord had been unable to walk more than a hundred yards without tripping. He had become increasingly paranoid about the cause, and Ian was beginning to agree with him. Njord hadn't displayed any clumsiness before, after all.

"Squirt squirtle!" Njord shouted furiously, presumably challenging whatever was tripping him up. Ian sighed and recalled his angry pokemon when no response came forth. He could see the campfire that the girls had set up ahead anyway.


	4. The Rocket

**Lance's Charges: Kanto**

A/N: This is finals week for me, so I won't be able to update again until next week at the earliest. Thanks to the few of you that have reviewed.

**Chapter 4: The Rocket**

David woke up before Lily and Marcus the following morning, and carefully packed up his sleeping bag. He left his pack with them, walking back the way they had come, his pokedex in hand. It only took him a few minutes to retrace their steps back to the clearing with the arcanine skeleton, which came as a relief. He hadn't been sure he would be able to find it in the light.

The group of rattata hadn't returned, thankfully, but there was one there, gnawing stubbornly on one of the arcanine's broken ribs. David wasn't sure if it had been with the original nine, but he now knew better than to expect it to ignore his presence. He brought out Theseus' pokeball and tapped it open with his forefinger.

The weedle came out and immediately zeroed in on the rattata, guessing based on the previous night that he would be battling it. The rattata turned and bared its teeth, dropping the bone where it stood. David noted that it didn't seem to recognize him; making it the tenth rattata they had seen in this clearing.

"Use string shot," David said, getting out his pokedex to scan the threat this rattata posed. He didn't like what he saw. It was notably stronger than Theseus in every category provided by the distance scan. However, even as he watched, Theseus evened the speed score by blanketing his opponent in liberal amounts of sticky string shot that even the speedy rattata couldn't dodge entirely.

"Poison sting," David said, watching as Theseus hurled himself at his foe, managing to strike it where one foreleg met its torso.

The rattata squealed in pain and responded with a tackle, knocking Theseus end-over-end and regaining the upper hand. One look at Theseus' dazed form told David that his bug-type didn't stand a chance in this fight.

"Theseus, try another string shot, we need to slow it down," David said, switching his pokedex to camera mode and flashing a couple of shots at the arcanine corpse. He wanted to send the pictures to Professor Atwood, to see if the professor might know what could do that sort of damage to an arcanine.

The rattata used quick attack to dodge the string shot, but Theseus was already backing away, out of the attack's range.

"Good try, Theseus, but I don't think we can beat this one," David said, recalling his weedle. The rattata didn't seem to like that its opponent had gotten off so easily, and growled at David. "Enjoy your meal," was all he said before turning back towards his camp. Luckily, the rattata decided against pursuing him.

Even as he sent the pictures to the professor, David was mentally replaying the battle in his mind. The rattata represented a pointed lesson for him. Though it looked just like the nine they had trounced the night before, it was far stronger than any two of them combined. David would have to be more careful in the future, he didn't want his pokemon hurt too badly, even though he knew that it was an inevitable part of being a trainer.

His main reason for getting into that battle had been the prospect of Theseus' evolution into kakuna. Bug pokemon, especially caterpie and weedle, were famous for evolving after only a few battles. He had half expected Theseus to evolve the previous night, actually. He'd have to curb that eagerness if he didn't want to endanger his pokemon any more than was strictly necessary. Theseus was injured now, so Apollo would be doing most of the battling for the day, unless the charmander's injuries were made too much worse.

When he got back to camp, Lily was still sleeping, but Marcus was up, holding his egg and looking ahead, his eyes unfocused.

"Where'd you go to?" Marcus asked.

"I was trying to train Theseus up," David explained. It wasn't quite a lie.

"Did he evolve?" Marcus had the same expectations as David, it seemed.

"No, he lost. I'm going to give him a break for a while. No reason to rush that kind of thing," David said sagely.

"Probably a good decision," Marcus agreed. "It'd be almost like me trying to break this egg open to see what's inside."

"I don't think you'd like what you'd find," David said, slightly disturbed by the images going through his mind.

"No, I doubt I would," Marcus said.

"What's happening, guys?" Lily asked sleepily, her face still buried in her sleeping bag.

"We're being attacked by a gyarados," David deadpanned.

"Ok, let me know if you need me to catch it," Lily said, rolling over and going back to sleep.

Marcus and David were unable to completely hold their laughter in, but they were quiet enough that Lily didn't stir again.

* * *

"It's like somebody flipped a switch on this place," Lily grumbled as Aerius swooped down to tackle a weedle, the sixth bug-type they had seen in the past hour.

"It's a bit strange," Marcus agreed, recalling his victorious pidgey. "I mean most of the regions where a certain type of pokemon are found this often, even seasonally, are marked in the pokedex."

"Maybe this isn't a seasonal thing," David said, spotting something hanging off of a tree. "What's that?"

"Dunno," Lily said, enlarging Vitisatoris' pokeball. "Let's find out."

The grass-type brought it down to Lily for closer examination, but it was Marcus who recognized it first. "It's pokemon bait."

"What?" David asked, having never heard the term before. Lily looked equally stumped.

"That's not really what it's called," Marcus explained. "It's just pokemon food, but the kind with a really strong smell. If you sent Theseus out, I bet you'd find that this pokemon food was especially tasty to bug-types."

"Look, there's another one over there!" Lily said, pointing at a tree a few yards behind them.

"I wonder who put these up," David said, looking at the small feeder in a vain attempt to identify something personal about it. There was nothing, of course.

"The feeders are mine," a boy said, stepping out from behind a tree. He blended in quite well. He was about average in height, but very thin. He wore a brown shirt and pants of the same exact color as the tree trunk he stood beside. His skin was tanned, and his hair was sandy in color. The only things about him that stood out were his bright green eyes.

"Trying to catch bug-types?" Marcus asked.

"Just one," the boy said. "Both of my current pokemon share a weakness against psychic-types, so I figured I could catch a bug-type here and maybe cancel out that weakness. All I've been able to find are weedle and kakuna, though, which are poison as well as bug."

"That's too bad. We've seen a caterpie or two today, though, so don't give up," David said.

"Thanks, but I'm honestly sick of searching at this point. Want to have a battle?" He was asking David, and a look at Lily and Marcus told him they weren't offended at being left out.

"Sure," David said, smiling and pulling out Apollo's pokeball. "Two pokemon each?"

"That's perfect, I've only got two pokemon anyway," he said tossing out a pokeball and releasing a koffing.

"Pretty unusual pokemon, is that your starter?" David asked, releasing Apollo.

"No, I caught him a few days ago," the boy said. "Carvano, use your poison gas!"

The koffing swelled ominously before releasing a puff of highly toxic gas towards Apollo. It was moving slowly enough that the charmander had no trouble at all evading it, but rather than dispersing, the dense cloud of gas remained, making one area of the battlefield effectively off-limits to Apollo.

"Hit him with an ember," David said, smiling grimly as his charmander shot a series of small flames at his opponent, scorching the koffing's side with the embers that hit it.

"Tackle it," the boy said, and Carnavo hastened to obey. Unfortunately, Apollo, like all other charmander, had a fantastic defense against such a straightforward attack. He swept his tail forward, batting the koffing to one side with it and worsening his burns slightly in the process. At that point they weren't more than a couple of patches of extremely tender skin, but that made Carnavo more susceptible to attacks in those spots than he should have been.

"Use smog," the boy called out, realizing that his koffing couldn't win a melee battle against the fire-type. The cloud of gas that the poison-type emitted this time moved far faster than the other time, but Apollo was able to disperse it with an ember after a quick order from David.

"Scratch it, but be ready to dodge if it tries any more poison moves," David said. Apollo obeyed, running forward and leaping into the air, but the koffing was able to levitate higher, pulling itself just out of reach.

"Try poison gas again, Carnavo!" the boy shouted.

"Ember!" David called out. The two attacks met in midair, but the ember broke through and slammed into Carvano, worsening his condition quite a bit.

"All right," the boy said, casting a worried look at his pokemon. "You win this round. Let's try our other two," he said, recalling his koffing and sending out his other pokemon, which turned out to be a makuhita.

Lily, who was ready to cheer for David after his first win, could only gape in surprise at the boy's other pokemon.

"You're not from around here, are you?" David asked, also staring in surprise at the rare pokemon.

"I'm from Hoenn, actually," the boy said. "I flew in to start my journey in Kanto. My parents don't think Hoenn is a good place for new trainers right now."

"Why not?" Marcus asked as David tossed Theseus' pokeball back and forth between his hands.

"There's all this gang warfare between the two dominant groups, Aqua and Terra. They're basically cults, with their members blindly following the completely psychotic higher-ups. The leader of Aqua wants to completely cover the world in water, and the Terra guy wants to get rid of the oceans altogether. Like I said, completely psychotic."

Lily let out a low whistle. "That's pretty messed up, but things aren't all that safe here either. We've got the Rockets to worry about, and they don't have a rival group to target, they just go after everyone."

"That's what my aunt said," the boy said, looking troubled. "I just came from her place in Saffron a couple of hours ago."

Lily brightened up at that. "Saffron? That's where we're–"

"Lily," David began, "do you think maybe this conversation could wait until _after_ the battle?" Theseus was now out, and seemed as impatient as his trainer.

The boy flushed. "Right, sorry about that. Let's get started. Nopargo, tackle it!"

"String shot," David said, using his standard opening move. The sticky strands slowed the makuhita down, but they by no means stopped it. Theseus was slammed into the ground, an attack that might have knocked him out had he not managed to slow down Nopargo's momentum.

"Keep hitting it with string shot!" David shouted, smiling grimly as the fighting-type tried unsuccessfully to fight through the thickening layers of string around it.

"What's he doing?" Lily asked, pointing at Theseus in shock. He had stopped aiming his string shot at his enemy, and was now shooting it at his own tail, freezing it in a slightly curved position. Carefully balancing atop his string-covered tail, Theseus began to shoot the strands straight up while Nopargo continued to struggle to break out of its bindings.

"It's evolving!" Marcus exclaimed, sharing a grin with David. "Looks like you got your wish after all."

"Yeah, although his timing is a little questionable," David replied. Finally, when Theseus was completely covered in silk, he began to glow. Soon, his body reshaped slightly, growing nearly a foot in length as he evolved into a kakuna.

"Harden and then use poison sting!" David called. The attack that Theseus was about to perform was technically a tackle, but he would only use it in response to a command to use poison sting. Pokemon researchers theorized that because both weedle and beedrill used poison sting, kakuna was actually using the same attack, it just lacked the poisonous stinger on the outside of its shell.

Theseus' color changed from yellow to gray momentarily as he hardened his outer shell, but he was back to yellow a second later, and hopping at Nopargo, who had just about removed the last of the string. It hadn't removed it fast enough, though. Right after tearing off the last of it, Nopargo found itself on its back on the ground after being slammed into by its slow-moving opponent.

"Use arm thrust," its trainer said.

"Harden again!" David commanded. It was a good thing that kakuna evolved into beedrill so early. Fighting against low-leveled pokemon without many move options was the only way a kakuna or a metapod could hope to beat something at their level. As it was, the makuhita was simply too young and inexperienced to use a strong arm thrust attack. The result of that attack on a kakuna that had used harden twice was Nopargo wincing as it flexed its bruised fingers.

"Poison sting again!" Nopargo was able to deflect Theseus' attack with a well-timed arm thrust, but its palm would have a bruise as a result. The kakuna was simply too hard to hit without feeling it. Nopargo turned back to its trainer plaintively.

"Damn, looks like I give again," the boy said, exchanging a silent look with his pokemon. "That was a fun battle, though. We should do it again sometime."

"Count on it," David said, recalling Theseus and walking over to shake his opponent's hand. "What's your name?"

"Mike Mallory," the boy said easily.

"I'm David Dowling. These are Lily Adams and Marcus White."

"Hey, maybe I'll get to battle one of you next time," Mike said, offering them a smile.

"Something to look forward to, I think," Marcus said, grinning back. "That was a great match. Did you catch that koffing here or in Hoenn?"

"I caught him in Saffron, actually," Mike said. "My aunt's neighbor kept complaining about a smell in the basement and it turned out to be Carnavo. You know, I should really get back to the search. I'd hate to imagine how badly I would've lost if you had a psychic-type."

"Good luck," Lily and David said together.

"He was pretty cool," David said a few minutes later when they were back on the trail. He was relieved by the fact that their battle seemed to have scared most of the nearby pokemon away, something that Mike was no doubt lamenting right then.

"Weird taste in pokemon, though," Lily said, her voice low.

"A bit," David agreed. Most trainers didn't like pure poison-types that much, with only a few exceptions, and koffing certainly wasn't one of them.

"His makuhita was pretty cool, though," Marcus said. "I wouldn't want one, or anything, but I'd love to catch something from Hoenn."

"Just imagine what they'll think of us when we travel out there," Lily said. "Sure, we have a lot of pokemon in common with them, like koffing, but I doubt any of them will have seen any of our starters in person, and definitely not Theseus."

"He said he came from Saffron, right?" David asked.

"Yeah, I wonder how close we are," Marcus said thoughtfully. "Probably at least an hour out, since he wouldn't want to put the bait too close to the city."

Neither Lily nor David had a better estimate.

* * *

It had been well over an hour, but the forest had, if anything, grown denser around them. Finally, when they came to a stream, Marcus and Lily agreed that a break to refill their water bottles was a good idea. David, whose bottle was still half-full, decided to walk downstream a bit and see if he could find any water pokemon. They wouldn't be useful in Vermillion or Celadon, but there was still no harm in carrying one around, and he'd be happy to have one for some of the other gyms. Realistically, there were so many water pokemon in the world that a well-rounded trainer couldn't justify _not_ having one.

Unfortunately, the only water pokemon he found were a pair of goldeen trapped in a reservoir. If the water-types had really wanted to, they could have hopped out and into the main stream, but they both seemed perfectly content where they were.

An anguished yell from ahead of him drew David's attention away from the pokemon. A second shout had him rushing ahead, hoping he could help whoever was in trouble. When he realized what was happening in the clearing up ahead, his blood ran cold. It was Mike, being held upside down by a large ursaring. The normal-type's trainer was leaning against a tree nearby. He was tall and broad, like his pokemon, with long straw-colored hair tied back in a ponytail and five o'clock shadow of the same color. He wore the same kind of wide-brimmed hat that some ranchers had, and had a plaid shirt unbuttoned over a t-shirt with the large red letter "R" in the middle of it, marking him as a Rocket.

"C'mon now, boy," he said contemptuously, his inflection sounding foreign to David's ears. "It's not like ya put much effort into training it yet, just hand over the makuhita and nobody has to get dead."

"Why do you want my makuhita? They aren't even rare!" Mike shouted, swinging vainly in the ursaring's grip.

"Maybe not where you come from, but 'round here, they ain't so common," the man said, scratching the stubble under his chin. "I know a few folks that'd pay a pretty high price for a Hoenn pokemon, especially one born 'n bred at the Mallory ranch."

David had heard enough. In his second stupidly suicidal move in less than twenty-four hours, he sent out both of his pokemon and stepped out into the clearing, giving Apollo a command immediately. The charmander streaked forward with speed brought on by desperation and slammed his tail into the ursaring's wrist, causing the massive pokemon to wince and drop Mike, who quickly ran to David's side. Apollo joined him a moment later.

"Interfering isn't a good idea," the Rocket snarled. "Only chance to leave here unharmed, kid. I got business with this one, you best leave well enough alone."

"Run," David whispered to Mike. Offering David a disbelieving look, Mike shook his head.

"Just go! Call the cops in Saffron and tell them to get their asses out here!" Finally, Mike agreed, clapping David on the shoulder before taking off. Swallowing the lump in his throat, David faced forward once more.

"You'll pay for that," the man said. "Madjaso, use take down!" The ursaring dipped its shoulder and ran at them. Theseus valiantly hardened his shell and jumped in the bigger pokemon's way but he was swatted aside, through the air and into a tree. Apollo was similarly knocked away. The attack itself was aimed at David, and he heard a pair of wet snaps as he was hit. He felt the air rushing through his hair and fingertips as he flew, and then he couldn't feel anything after hitting the ground. His vision was swimming, but he was awake enough to hear the Rocket's parting words.

"Still alive, are you? Next time you won't be so lucky. Be happy that your pokemon are too pathetic to steal, or I'd take 'em with me." The last thing David heard was a high-pitched siren before the world went black.

* * *

"David? Lily, look, he's waking up!"

"David? Oh David!" the words started to come into better focus when he felt his hand being squeezed. David opened his eyes, or tried to, before being blinded by a white light.

"Too bright." David's voice rasped. His throat felt dry and painful, but it was nothing compared to the throbbing that came from his right side.

"Turn off the lights, Marcus," he heard Lily snap. A second later, the uncomfortable feeling encroaching on his eyelids lessened considerably.

"Thanks," David said, opening his eyes. The first thing he saw was Lily. Her eyes were bloodshot from crying, but she still managed to look as pretty as ever.

"What the hell happened?" Marcus asked. His eyes weren't red, but they were wide with concern. "We got there and found you and Theseus unconscious with Apollo guarding you. And he looked about ready to pass out as well!"

"There was a–" David paused and coughed, feeling every bruise in his body as he did. "Can I have some water?" Lily smiled tremulously and brought a cup forward that she had apparently been holding in her other hand. David took it in his free one and took a long, slow sip. "Thanks, that's much better," he said, handing it back. "So where was I?"

"You hadn't said anything yet," Lily said impatiently, giving him a warm smile.

"Well, there was a Rocket in the forest," David said.

"Wait, you mean–" Marcus began.

"The murdering, thieving kind, not the spaceship kind," David confirmed.

"What was a Rocket doing in there?" Lily asked.

"He was after Mike's makuhita," David explained.

Marcus frowned. "I know it's almost impossible to find one _here_, but they're downright common in Hoenn."

"Which is the one region the Rockets haven't expanded to," Lily pointed out. "That's why Johto's branch of the Pokemon League hates ours so much."

"Because we couldn't control our little _problem_," David finished.

"Is Mike ok?" Marcus asked.

"I think so," David answered. "He ran off to get the Saffron police."

Marcus looked immensely relieved to hear that. "Well he succeeded. They came up right after we found you."

David grinned. "Glad he made it. I hope he goes back to Hoenn, 'cause this place really isn't safe for him."

"So far, it's proven even less safe for you," Lily said.

"Fair point, but I'm not going anywhere," David said. "Unless you were dumb enough to call my parents...you didn't!"

"Of course not," Lily said defensively. "You were out for less than a day, so I'm sure they aren't even worried yet. We could still be in the forest, as far as they know."

"That's a relief," David said. "What do you think, should I tell them what happened?"

"_We_ still don't know exactly what happened," Marcus reminded him.

"I got hit by that stupid Rocket's ursaring," David said impatiently. "Me and both of my pokemon. Speaking of, where are they?"

"I took them to the pokemon center for you," Marcus said. "Just got back a couple of minutes before you woke up, actually."

"And they're ok?"

"Pokemon are way tougher than people," Marcus said. "Well, except for Bruno and other nutcases like him."

"I'm glad they're all right," David said.

"We're glad _you're_ all right," Lily shot back, giving his hand another squeeze.

"I am, too," David said, meaning it. "Any idea when I can get out of here?"

Marcus shrugged. "The doctor said something about having another test that they needed you awake for, but I didn't get the impression that it'd take too long."

* * *

An officer was waiting for David when they left the hospital. He questioned him briefly, and was noticeably disappointed by the lack of details that David could provide. Still, he thanked him for his testimony before disappearing into the massive crowd that seemed to perpetually be walking around Saffron, the largest city in Kanto.

"You know," David began, scratching his bandaged ribs, "I don't think I'm appreciating this place quite as much as I should be."

"We're only passing through, anyway," Marcus pointed out. "The gym isn't even of interest to us yet."

"And I didn't become a pokemon trainer to check out the tourist traps," Lily added.

"I doubt any of us did," David said, laughing until his side hurt, which happened immediately. "There's a tram that goes across town, right? I really don't feel like walking through ten miles of this crowd."

"Yeah, the stop is just at the end of the block," Marcus said. "I was thinking we could stay in the pokemon center at the south end of the city, though. No point in camping out tonight if we don't have to."

"I think I could stand to slow down after that last battle, too," David said, knowing full well that Marcus had only suggested that because of his injury.

They'd only had to wait a few minutes for the tram, which ran once every half-hour. The three trainers didn't get on quickly enough to get any seats, but standing up was an adventure in itself. Lily in particular had a lot of fun trying to stand up without holding the handrail, much to the chagrin of other nearby passengers.

They disembarked at the southernmost stop and found the pokemon center without any real difficulty. It helped that Marcus had checked his pokedex and found a map of Saffron with all of the trainer-relevant places marked.

The center itself was smaller than the buildings that surrounded it, but they knew that it was actually one of the largest of its kind in Kanto. Even so, it was quite busy. Marcus volunteered to try to get them a room while David and Lily looked around. He was the only one who had already been in one, after all.

The entryway was fairly spacious, though not nearly as spacious as the waiting room. Straight ahead was the main check-in station that was used for common, everyday injuries. None of their pokemon's injuries earlier had justified the use of the emergency or specialized care units, which lay a bit further back, right by the larger side doors. Most of the facility fell under those two units, primarily the healing areas for large pokemon like onix. Pokemon centers in rural areas often had to locate those outside, but the Saffron pokemon centers were exceptions.

Marcus returned just then, looking exasperated. "I got us a room, let's get out of here before another one of these idiots challenges one of us to a battle."

David frowned. "What are you talking about? How can we have a battle in the middle of the city?"

"No one here seems too concerned about that," Marcus said. "They're anchored."

David and Lily's expressions immediately soured. Calling someone anchored was one of the lowest insults one trainer could level against another. It referred to the idea some trainers had of staying close to a pokemon center so they could battle their pokemon as hard as they wanted, without any form of self-restraint. The attitude among those trainers was that if the healing was so readily available, why not battle harder? Pokemon researchers hadn't found any correlations yet between anchored trainers and unstable pokemon, but that was mostly because no one was willing to put the theory to the test in a lab. No one wanted to be that abusive to pokemon. While anchoring was not illegal in itself, far more cases of pokemon negligence and abuse had been leveled against anchored trainers than non-anchored ones.

The trainers hurried upstairs to one of the spartan rooms provided for trainers. They attracted stares along the way, but no challenges were leveled, presumably because David's injury put the other trainers off. Anchored trainers didn't like the reminder that human injuries couldn't be treated nearly as quickly as those inflicted on pokemon.


	5. Njord's Shadow

**Lance's Charges: Kanto**

A/N: Sorry for the long delay, but that's a problem I have that doesn't look to be going away anytime soon. On the advice of a reviewer, I'm going to begin to list the pokemon belonging to relevant trainers before each chapter along with their names and genders. Thanks again to those of you who have reviewed.

Ian: Squirtle/Male/Njord

Catherine: Totodile/Female/Karina, Nidoran/Male/Blake, Growlithe/Male/Donovan

Madison: Bulbasaur/Female/Lopia

**Chapter 5: Njord's Shadow**

"Hey, why don't you have Njord out with you?" Madison asked Ian as they continued northeast towards the main path. She had released Lopia, and Catherine had sent out her nidoran, Blake, as well to keep them company.

"Didn't I tell you?" Ian asked, running his hands through his hair in frustration. "He kept tripping over things yesterday. He's convinced that some kind of prankster pokemon is following him around, and by the time we got back to the camp last night, I almost believed him."

"That doesn't sound all that implausible," Catherine said thoughtfully. "Pokemon can sometimes do pretty strange things, after all."

"Maybe," Ian acknowledged. "Either way, I'm not up for dealing with it right now. Maybe I'll bring him out after lunch and try to capture whatever this thing is."

"I'll keep an eye out," Madison said.

With that settled, the trio continued forward, eager to meet the challenges that their second day of training would bring.

The plains were no less beautiful than they had been the previous day, but a couple of hours' worth of walking through morning dew gave the young trainers a new appreciation for the sun. They hadn't yet encountered any pokemon on their chosen path, but had already spotted a great number in the area.

About a half-mile ahead of them was a large stream, one that they would probably have to be careful wading across. Their topic of discussion swiftly turned to the water pokemon that would undoubtedly be plentiful there. Since both Ian and Catherine's starters were water types, neither one seriously expected to capture anything there. It was still fun to theorize about Madison's seemingly inevitable capture, though.

"I've got it, I've got it!" Ian exclaimed, interrupting Catherine, who was trying to explain why a seel wouldn't likely be found in a mere stream. He waited until both girls had turned their attention to him before continuing. "You've got to catch a magikarp!"

"Ian!" Madison shouted. "Be serious!"

"Magikarp wouldn't be that bad of a choice, actually," Catherine said thoughtfully.

"What?!" Madison and Ian said in unison.

"It would be great long-term," Catherine said. "Don't look at me like that! If a trainer takes her time and raises a magikarp properly, it'll be fiercely loyal even as a gyarados."

"Not exactly ideal for a first capture, though," Madison said.

"Yeah, I was mostly joking," Ian said.

"I know, I know," Catherine sighed. "But gyarados would be so cool!"

Madison laughed and embraced her long-time friend while Ian openly gaped at Catherine. He had never seen her so unrestrained before in his life. It took him almost a full minute before he was able to come up with his next idea.

"How about a staryu?"

"That might be fun," Madison said, "but it kinda weirds me out that they don't have faces."

"And five identical limbs," Ian said, wiggling his fingers obnoxiously. "Which part would you look at when you talk to it?"

"I still think magikarp would work," Catherine said mischievously, poking Madison in the side.

"Then why don't you catch one yourself?" a smiling Madison retorted, poking the far more ticklish Catherine back in response.

They continued on a similar vein until they were nearly at the stream, when Madison and Catherine recalled their pokemon and predictably raced the rest of the way. Ian was content to let the two run ahead without him, so the others didn't even notice him trip on the same unseen something that had plagued his squirtle the day before.

To his credit, Ian didn't miss a beat, rolling with the fall and releasing his only occupied pokeball. As Njord materialized, the pair's mystery tormenter was revealed in the form of a smug looking bellsprout...At least as far as bellsprout were capable of looking smug.

Ian scanned the bellsprout with his pokedex to better prepare, but Njord finally had his personal tormenter in his sights, and wasn't about to allow it to escape. He launched himself forward with a grunt, attempting to overwhelm his opponent with his opening salvo.

The bellsprout proved up to the task, though, and practically flowed around the attack, its flexible torso and limbs as smooth as flowing water. Njord, faced with the prospect of landing face-first in the dirt, quickly tucked his head down and thrust his arms forward, doing a complete flip and landing painfully on his hands and knees.

"Njord, we need to be smart about this," Ian snapped, chastising his hotheaded water-type. "He can hear any orders I give as well as you can, so I want you to remember to stay cool. Fight your fight, but don't commit too much to an attack or you'll just end up in the dirt. Got it?"

The bellsprout, due to his lack of vocal chords, could only make noise by popping his lips. The speed of the pops, as well as the gentle shaking of his body clued Ian into the fact that he was laughing. Laughing at them.

"Stay calm!" Ian warned, but he needn't have worried. The bellsprout's laughter, rather than heating up Njord's anger, cooled it into something calm and deliberate. They could use that.

Njord took slow, deliberate steps forward, his walk slowly turning into a trot. The bellsprout's laughter tapered off as he prepared to defend himself, still refusing to take the offensive. Ian counted that as a positive, since the only technical attack bellsprout knew at that level was vine whip, which affected squirtle (and other water-types) more strongly than most pokemon.

The bellsprout exploded into motion when Njord was only a few feet away, drumming his leaf arms against the ground briefly before launching one forward in a vine whip attack. It transformed and stretched more than two feet forward and swiped sideways to meet the squirtle, but Njord was able to slow down just enough for the attack to fall short. He came in with all his strength in its wake, tackling the crafty grass-type with his left shoulder while keeping his right arm out wide in case the vine was able to make a return trip.

It wasn't, and the bellsprout looked considerably worse-off than before when Njord bounced back onto his feet. The vine that had effectively replaced his right arm lay limp on the ground until, with a shake, it retracted back into its earlier leaf form. A new vine then extended from its left arm, this one a bit slimmer, but no less dangerous to Ian's pokemon than the other.

"He's still dangerous," Ian said. "Be careful."

The squirtle bobbed his head in response, not taking his eyes off of his opponent, who had begun to slowly approach. The bellsprout's movements, unlike before, were jerky and nervous. When the bellsprout was only a few feet away he began swinging his vine back and forth in front of him, forcing Njord to back away or risk the sting of his vine.

"Try going around it," Ian said.

Njord began by attempting to strafe around the attack, but the bellsprout effortlessly pivoted, forcing the water-type to try more daring tactics. He jumped backwards and attempted to dive around, but the bellsprout was always ready for his movements. Finally getting impatient, Njord tried to repeat the success of his first hit, but the bellsprout wouldn't fall for the same trick twice. The vine's speed suddenly doubled, and Njord found himself reeling from an impressive strike, a bright red welt on his cheek.

The grass-type pressed his advantage, whipping his vine at even greater speeds in an attempt to further the damage to his opponent. Njord was just barely able to escape with only a couple of unfelt glancing blows to his shell.

"Damn," Ian muttered.

* * *

Before Ian's battle had even begun, Madison and Catherine were berating each other for scaring off all of the water pokemon in the stream with their race.

"I think I saw one head that way," Madison said, pointing towards the sun, which was still low.

"There's glare on the water!" Catherine objected.

"Well we have to start looking somewhere!"

"What about Ian?"

Madison turned to look back with her friend and recognized the telltale flash of a pokemon being released from its ball. "He looks busy to me."

"Hang on, let me check my binoculars before we go in either direction," Catherine said, swinging her pack off of her shoulders and into the grass.

"Good idea," Madison agreed. "This stream isn't as deep as I thought it would be. Do you think we'll find anything?"

"Probably nothing big, but more than just water pokemon need water," Catherine pointed out, refocusing her binoculars to the West.

"I hope we find something," Madison said.

"I think we just did," Catherine said, leaning forward to such an extent that it was clear to Madison that she was squinting through her binoculars.

"Are you sure?"

"No, but it looks red, and it's at the water's edge on our side of the stream," Catherine said, handing the binoculars over to her friend.

"Don't bother, I trust you. Let's check it out, but slowly and quietly."

"Of course. You set the pace."

After Catherine repacked her binoculars, Madison led her a few yards back the way they had come. Both paused briefly and watched Ian's squirtle take a blow to the cheek, but Catherine allowed herself to be pulled away. As they continued west, both girls were able to spot the pokemon, and it was a pokemon, that Catherine had seen.

"A krabby?" the taller girl asked.

"I think so. Can you go ahead that way, about ten or fifteen feet past it to block its escape if it tries to run?"

"Sure. I'll have Karina and Blake ready to drive it back towards you. I'd use Donovan as well, but the krabby would probably go right for a fire-type if given the choice."

"Two should be plenty. Krabby is slow, so it wouldn't be able to outrun any of your pokemon, let alone two at once. Go ahead, I'll give you half a minute to get ready before I go in."

"Don't forget to scan it with your pokedex," Catherine said.

"I won't. If it's too tough, I won't go out there and face it. If you don't see me come out in two minutes, come around back. Does that sound good?"

"Yeah," Catherine said, knowing that if Ian could see Madison now, he'd be just as shocked as he had been at her easygoing attitude earlier. Madison being serious was a sight to behold.

The shorter girl approached, her pokedex out and actively scanning. As soon as it registered the krabby (a female), she let out a sigh of relief. The krabby was very similar to Lopia stat-wise, but her only harmful attack at that level was bubble, which wouldn't affect Lopia too much. Still, her bulbasaur would have to watch out for the krabby's claws. She might not know any attacks with them yet, but they were still quite heavy, and a hit from one of them would hurt.

Madison released her bulbasaur when she was only a few yards away, as close as she thought she'd be able to get undetected. The sudden flash of red startled the krabby, but like most slow-running pokemon, the water-type didn't even think of fleeing.

"Lopia, use leech seed!"

Finally obeying her trainer's commands consistently, the bulbasaur lowered her front legs and straightened her back ones, tilting the bulb on her back forward enough that when the small, brown seed shot forth, it hit its target. Before the krabby knew what hit her, one of her claws was all but useless, wrapped up in an energy draining plant.

The krabby scuttled towards Lopia, bashing her trapped claw repeatedly against the ground as she moved. Finally, when the leech was almost complete anyway, the krabby was able to tear her bound claw free with the tip of the other one, but Lopia was far from idle during that time. Feeling especially powerful after the leech, Lopia scampered forward and bashed her opponent with a tackle attack right when the krabby had both claws in front of her face. Since the water-type scuttled sideways, the attack proved quite effective, and all but finished her off.

"Let's give it a shot," Madison said with a smile, tossing her nest ball in the general direction of the prone pokemon. Like a strong magnet, it curved down to hit its target, but was unexpectedly batted aside by a claw when the button was only inches away. The ball lay on the side of the battlefield, useless until it could be recovered.

Looking up, Madison saw Catherine for the first time since the battle began. She'd been so focused that she hadn't even seen her friend enter her line of sight. The platinum blonde only had Karina out, silently telling Madison that she had faith in her.

"Looks like this one won't quit until it's over, Lopia. Try another tackle, but watch out for its claws."

Lopia barked out an agreement and dashed forward once again, having to wade into the stream to hit her opponent. In her weakened state, the krabby was even slower than normal, so neither Madison nor her bulbasaur were particularly concerned that she would get away. Within seconds, Lopia had managed to slide in between the attacking claws, and prepared to deliver another devastating tackle.

Only to receive a bubble attack full in the face.

If she hadn't been resistant to water attacks, that alone might have finished Lopia off, but she was able to shake it off and come back a second later with a slightly weaker tackle. Not one to take any unnecessary chances, Madison tossed a regular pokeball before the krabby had recovered, catching her easily.

When it was clear that her friend had succeeded, Catherine finally approached to congratulate her. "You did so well, Maddy!"

"Thanks," Madison said, hugging her friend. "Way to go, Lopia!" Her victorious pokemon didn't acknowledge the compliment, but did begin to nudge the krabby's pokeball in her trainer's direction.

"It's a shame the nest ball didn't work," Catherine said, walking over and picking it up. "Was it a gift from your parents?"

"Yep! I'm actually glad that my new krabby was tough enough to knock a pokeball aside. Not all wild ones have the reflexes, especially not after getting beaten up so badly."

"Very true, have you thought of a name?"

"I'm calling her Santi, I think," Madison said, accepting the nest ball from her friend. "Shall we go see if Ian finally caught up to his stalker?"

Catherine grinned. "Yes, let's."

* * *

Meanwhile, on Ian's advice, Njord was now fighting with extreme caution while his trainer worked on a new strategy. His early tackle had hurt the bellsprout, but it was now painfully clear that the sneaky grass-type had been exaggerating his injury.

"Njord, I don't think we're going to make it out of this without taking another hit or two, so let's make them count! I need you to grab it near the base of its vine as best you can, and then go to town!"

Njord grimaced at the thought of feeling the sting of that vine again, but started forward anyway. When he was close, the bellsprout popped mockingly and began swinging his vine again, tantalizingly slow this time.

"Try a tail whip to intercept it," Ian said.

His squirtle obediently swung his body around, intercepting the stinging vine with his tail. Fortunately, he caught the vine near its base, forcing it to wrap around his tail several times over and taking only minimal damage in the process. His mind working almost as one with his trainer's, Njord then completed the full turn and grabbed the skinny pokemon with both hands, easily wrapping his fists around the grass-type's torso and arms. With a decidedly evil grin, Njord spat a bubble attack right into his opponent's face.

"Great! Now toss it and pull it back down!"

Once again following his trainer's train of thought perfectly, Njord flung his extremely lightweight opponent up into the air in front of him, only to pull him back down with his bound tail, backing away enough to let the bellsprout his the ground face first. His tail was now in a considerable amount of pain, having been wrenched viciously by the bellsprout's weight, but Njord was still much better off than his foe.

"Jump to the far side, and see if you can get the vine off of your tail," Ian said, pokeball in hand.

Njord found that command easy to follow, because the vine had gone somewhat slack after the impact. The bellsprout was shakily trying to rise even as the squirtle freed his tail, but this time the shakiness was no act. Ian didn't give him time to recover, though, nailing him in the back of the head with a pokeball.

When the ball shut down with its capture, Ian pumped his fist in the air and screamed out his victory. Njord, on the other hand, sat down and lay back, gently patting the big welt on his cheek.

"Come on, Njord," Ian said, grabbing his bellsprout's pokeball and placing it back on his belt. "I've got a potion for you somewhere in this stupid bag."

After using most of a potion on his first pokemon, Ian joined Njord on the ground, content to wait for his friends to return, which they did just a few minutes later.

"Did you catch it?" Madison called out when they were still a few yards away.

"Of course! That crazy bellsprout won't be tripping us up anymore!" Ian said.

"Congrats! I made my first capture as well."

"A krabby," Catherine put in.

"Did it put up a tough fight?"

"Lopia beat her pretty easily, but she did knock the first ball I threw at her away like it was nothing," Madison said, still extremely proud of her pokemon.

"Lucky you, we were in the battle of the century over here," Ian bragged, "but we pulled it out in the end."

"I'm calling my krabby Santi, have you decided on a name yet?"

"There's only one name that really fits this bellsprout, I've gotta call him Trip."

Catherine and Madison both laughed a bit at that, but with approval.

The group didn't linger much longer, continuing on their way as soon as Ian recalled his weary squirtle. Over the next few hours, they didn't encounter many wild pokemon. Catherine's trio took care of most of the ones they did run into with some help from the relatively unhurt Lopia. They had just finished lunch when all three pokedexes began to beep.

"What the heck? I thought I put mine on silent," Ian said, reaching into a pocket for his pokedex.

"Don't you recognize the tone? That's a League alert. It overrides silent settings," Catherine explained.

"It says here that the Rockets were spotted at Mt. Moon, and that local trainers should be careful," Madison said, her eyes scanning her own machine.

"Isn't that where we're headed after Cerulean?" Ian asked.

"It was," Catherine began carefully, "but we might want to start devising a backup plan. I know I don't want to go into a dark cave and fight a bunch of terrorists."

"If the league says it's ok by the time we're through in Cerulean, then it won't be a problem," Madison said. "Otherwise, um...Any ideas?"

"Several," Catherine said, surprising no one. "First, of course, we could go around Mt. Moon to Pewter. That might not be safe either, though, depending on what the League says. A safer bet would be to go through Celadon, which would mean either going back home or going through Saffron. I think that unless we can go straight to Pewter, we should go through the rock tunnel to Lavender."

"And then to Fuchsia?" Ian asked.

"Probably, but if we have to go there, we can decide later."

"We'll be spending at least a couple of days in Cerulean anyway," Madison said. "The League doesn't mess around when they're dealing with Rockets, so the problem should be resolved before we head that way. I know I'm not going to leave the area before catching an abra."

"That will probably take all three of us to catch," Ian said. "Unless you count leech seed, bulbasaur won't learn anything that can slow abra's teleport until just before evolving. Can krabby?"

"No, she won't learn anything of use," Madison said. "When does bellsprout learn wrap?"

"Pretty soon," Ian said. "There's no guarantee that wrap will prevent teleport, but it's better than nothing."

"Just like leech seed," Catherine said. "Combine the two with your nest ball and you shouldn't have too much trouble."

"Finding one is the trick," Ian said. "We should check out the market in town and see if they have anything that might lure an abra out into the open."

"Great thinking," Madison enthused.

The three friends all shared a solemn look, one that reflected the unspoken agreement between them to ensure that Madison successfully caught an abra.


End file.
